Overall Objectives of the Regional Water Partnership in Central Asia and Southern Caucasus
Following to the Johannesburg Declaration (2002), the ultimate objectives of the activities of Central Asia and Caucasus Partnership Network are to support and assist the regional countries in implementation of the Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) principles towards meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) related to water. This process foreseen as a support to policy dialogues, which will be accompanied by public involvement in decision-making, creation the political will addressing to strengthening of cooperation between sectors and countries, initiating mutual understanding among all stakeholders and supporting practical activities locally implemented including capacity building.
Actually GWP CACENA is a well established regional networking actor, who helps the region to work out difficult inter-state water resources issues as well as the countries to develop an Integrated Water Resources Management approach in polices and practices. The concept of providing a neutral platform for dialogues has grown in significance since GWP CACENA was established in 2002. Within the next five year strategy period, 2009-2013, the regional water resources will have to be higher ranked on the policy agendas in order to meet critical for the region development challenges.
GWP CACENA strategy 2009-2013
According to the Regional Strategy adopted in 2008 for next five years period (2009-2013), during 2009 - the first year of the new cycle - the GWP CACENA network developed an agreement on subsequent strategic actions for strengthening of country water partnerships in the region in order to reinforce the results in hand (from the past years of 2003-2008) in promoting the concept of IWRM towards sustainable development in all eight countries and to sustain their cooperation capacities (keeping in mind specifics of the two sub-regions – Central Asia and Southern Caucasus).
During the second stage of the new cycle – the years 2010-2011 – the GWP CACENA network will focus on promotion of its neutral platform (in cooperation with other active actors – e.g. Executive Committee of IFAS, Finland, APWF, ADB, SDC, EU, UNECE, et al.) for dialogues among countries / stakeholders on the most challenging issues (transboundary cooperation, climate change adaptation, drinking water supply and sanitation and further promotion of the IWRM concept) – with the principal goal: to help countries to achieve sustainable cooperation processes.
During the third, final stage of the new cycle – the years 2012-2013 – the GWP CACENA network based on the established sustainable cooperation platform will be focusing on a more substantive programme of activities – to help countries with implementation of their agreed measures, which will appear at the stage as outcomes of the above-mentioned dialogues. Thus, the work programme for this stage should be specified in 2011.
The Work Plan of 2010 includes four dimensions of activities in accordance with the GWP Strategy 2009-2013:
- Promote water as a key part of sustainable national development
- Address critical development challenges
- Reinforce knowledge sharing and communications
- Build a more effective network
Financial support to the GWP CACENA activities
The GWP CACENA activities in 2010 supported by the GWP core budget and by Government of Finland within its Wider Europe Initiative, which is a framework programme for Finland’s development cooperation with former Soviet republics in order to promote stability and well-being extensively both in partner countries and in the whole continent. The framework programme is based on the Government Programme, which emphasises crisis prevention, support for peace processes and cooperation in environmental issues. Via GWP CACENA the initiative comprises two (of in total three) regional cooperation programmes addressing to the South Caucasus (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia) and Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) .
Also, a number of activities in 2010 expected to be supported by ADB within the big scope of the APWF programmes (with involvement of JWF) and in line with on-going projects, financed in the region by ADB.
CONTENTS OF THE GWP CACENA NETWORK ACTIVITIES IN 2010
According to the above-mentioned Regional Strategy during the year 2010 the GWP CACENA network should be focusing on the principal goal: to help countries to achieve sustainable cooperation processes on the way forward widely implementation of the IWRM practice (both at the national and sub-regional levels).
Strategic Goal 1: Promote water as a key part of sustainable national development
For countries well advanced in IWRM planning (Kazakhstan), GWP CACENA will emphasize local engagement and capacity building to apply improved water management and to put into practice their policies. For countries that pursue IWRM plans (Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan), or even not started planning yet (Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkmenistan), GWP CACENA will help them to develop their capacity to complete plans and to support practical IWRM implementation. GWP CACENA will help practitioners to put into place the links between water and national development priorities, and build capacity to solve real problems and help countries progress towards water security. Certain efforts should be addressing to promotion IWRM at the basin level, including transboundaty issues.
Strategic Goal 2: Address critical development challenges
Different critical and emerging challenges (economic in transition, rapid demographic change, climate change, rising food prices, less attention to issues of water supply and sanitation, etc.) implicate water management specifics within the CACENA region. In such circumstances, to remain relevant and effective GWP CACENA must articulate how water management plays a role for sustainable development and what instruments could be used for that. GWP CACENA will assist countries to increase human capacities via training seminars and publications dissemination. These will help to develop solutions by using GWP’s convening power to gather widely divergent stakeholders, and draw on the intellectual capacity of the whole GWP network.
In the past GWP has made important contributions to water and sustainable development at the global, regional and national levels. The network has developed a strong conceptual basis through publications on issues ranging from climate adaptation, infrastructure development, river basin organizations, and water supply and sanitation. To support countries for IWRM planning, the GWP TEC published 14 TEC papers and prepared the Catalyzing Change series – 9 Policy Briefs and 5 Technical Briefs, and many other publications (the most of them translated into Russian). The Regional Water Partnership will bring together global (GWP TEC) and local knowledge and deliver technical advice to the countries addressing their challenging issues. Reshaping, invigorating and investing in the GWP IWRM ToolBox will be a serious part of these efforts.
- Table 2
Strategic Goal 3: Reinforce knowledge sharing and communications
A comprehensive communications strategy should be implemented for the CACENA region that builds on the GWP knowledge base and extends the influence of water advocates to the broader scope of social and economic development. The main goal is to create real intellectual leadership of GWP network in the CACENA region, which will influence water related policy at all levels, and also deliver operationally, through practical guides, sharing lessons across countries and regions, and using communications for advocacy, feedback, and monitoring of IWRM implementation results.
The key emphasis will be to sharpen GWP’s messaging and ensure that those messages reach the intended audiences in the CACENA countries. There should be established effective ways to communicate GWP’s contributions and achievements to donor partners, policy-makers, water professionals, the media and public at large.
The certain attention should be paid to involvement of young people into water related issues via proper contribution from GWP CACENA to some on-going regional programmes addressing creation of a New Generation of Water Leaders. In this respect there will be continued collaboration with Helsinki University of Technology (TKK group). It will cover involvement young professionals from Universities in CACENA countries under leadership of TUH/TKK into joint preparation of Policy Briefs on IWRM issues and dissemination of these papers during policy dialogue meetings (see SG-1). Study tours for students are planned for visiting sites of pilot projects in CACENA to learn practicalities of the IWRM implementation.
- Table 3
Strategic Goal 4: Build a more effective network
At the end of 2009 the CACENA Regional Water Partnership (which was established in December 2006) comprises 6 Country Water Partnerships and 148 registered partners from eight countries. This extensive network has allowed GWP CACENA to better support and influence national and regional policies and actions. In general, GWP’s light and flexible network structure allows it to focus on local priorities, and empower local actors to bring their concerns to the national, regional and global levels. The Governance of GWP – understood as the division of rights, roles, responsibilities and accountabilities across the partnership – will continue to evolve so that it can best support the achievement of the strategic goals in the strategy period 2009 – 2013.
- Table 4
Agreed by the Regional Council of the GWP CACENA in Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic on December 10, 2009