"The Nourish and Flourish Flagship Report addresses the urgent challenge of sustainably feeding a projected 10 billion people by 2050—something current agricultural water management (AWM) practices can only support for less than half the current population and only about a third of the 10 billion people project in 2050. It reframes AWM not merely as a production input, but as a platform to deliver economy-wide gains across Prosperity, People, and Planet. The report introduces a Water/Food Nexus framework that categorizes countries by water stress (high/low) and food trade position (net importer/exporter), enabling tailored, context-specific solutions rather than one-size-fits-all approaches.
The analysis shows that strategic AWM investments can unlock major development dividends. Converting rainfed systems to irrigation and modernizing existing schemes can create an estimated 245 million jobs globally—around 218 million in Sub-Saharan Africa—and boost agricultural GDP by up to 46%. While irrigated land repr
