GWP Reference Group visits WACDEP countries

Two members of the WACDEP Reference Group Madam Patience Agyare- Kwabi, a Gender expert from Ghana and Dr. Roberto Martin-Hurtado, an Economist from the United Kingdom and team leader visited Burkina Faso and Ghana, the two West African countries where the WACDEP is being implemented.

In addition to the two the mission included in Burkina the Network Officer Manuel FULCHIRON and Armand HOUANYE of the WACDEP Coordination Unit. They met with the WACDEP implementing team of the Country Water Partnership of Burkina and key national partners involved in the program such as the Permanent Secretariat for IWRM (SP/PAGIRE), the General Directorate of Budget, the General Directorate for Water, the Danish Embassy as well as the AMCOW TAC member in the country. These meetings allowed a better understanding of the national context and give some feedback to the WACDEP team on the implementation of the program.

In Ghana the team joined by Andrew Takawira of the Coordination Unit has a 2- day working session with the WACDEP Management Unit and its Technical Working Group (TWG) in Ghana. With the WACDEP Ghana Management Team the RG discussed on the implementation and looked at how to ensure WACDEP adds value to on-going and or upcoming country processes, provided technical support to the WACDEP programming and deliverables; and reviewed and supported the overall quality of key outputs of the WACDEP in Ghana.

Moving forward, the committee deliberated on investments opportunities available in the country and how best WACDEP could help in coming up with a national investment plan in the water sector. The chair, on behalf of the committee, thanked the RG members, the Coordinating Unit and the West African Office for their participation and for their insights into the investment aspects of WACDEP and how the impact could be maximised.

The regional WACDEP manager Mr. Mahamoudou TIEMTORE took part in deliberations in both countries.