29 May 2021, the Junior Water Prize (JWP) Final was broadcast live to 900,000 audiences online. 15 teams of 13-18-year-old students from 8 provinces shared their innovative products and answered the jury to realize their innovative solutions to improve water and environment development. Zhan Hanchu and Huang Haoxing, Guangdong Experimental Middle School, won the award for their "voice-controlled water saving device”.
13 October marks the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction. The day is centered around the seven targets of the Sendai Framework, and this year focuses on Target D: reduce disaster damage to critical infrastructure and disruption of basic services. According to the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) floods are the most common natural disaster with the largest impacts on society. GWP Senior Network Specialist Frederik Pischke says that there are great published insights that can help those in need to build resilience – online HelpDesks on flood & drought management offer practical support.
Next up in our series of partners speaking about why their communities should submit their change journeys to the Water ChangeMaker Awards, we have two youth organisations. In an energetic and interactive Facebook Live, we spoke with Lindsey Aldaco-Manner, President of the World Youth Parliament for Water (WYPW), as well as Maitreyi Koduganti Venkata, Coordinator of the Water Governance Group at the Water Youth Network (WYN).
Within the framework of Water Climate Development Program- Gender (WACDEP-G), GWP-CAf organized the first WACDEP-G capacity building workshop in the region on October 14th 2020 in Yaounde, Cameroon.
This month, Howard Bamsey began his duties as the new Chair of GWP. He did so with a visit to the global secretariat in Stockholm, Sweden, where he met staff and got briefed on current issues around the network. We took the opportunity to discuss his thoughts on joining GWP, and his reflections on some of GWP’s most recent activities at the UN climate change conference, COP24, in December.
In one of its key activities at COP25, GWP announced a new collaboration with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and other partners, to create plausible water solutions for a climate-resilient future in 2030 and beyond. The initiative is called "Water Resilience Frontiers: Pathways for transformational Climate Resilient Water Security in 2030 and Beyond".
The Department of Agriculture, Water Resources and Environment of the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU/UEMOA) Commission in collaboration with Global Water Partnership West Africa (GWP-WA) held a virtual regional workshop on the theme of ''Water Governance and Sustainable Development Goals: progress and challenges at the local level in the WAEMU region''.
In preparation for the upcoming GWP Network Meeting 2020, GWP-CAf organized a virtual meeting on October 16th with the participation of over 45 partners from Congo, Central Africa Republic, Cameroon, Chad and Sao Tome and Principe.
