World Rivers Day is observed each year on the last Sunday of September and it is a celebration of the world's waterways. It highlights the many values of rivers and strives to increase public awareness and encourages the improved stewardship of rivers around the world. Rivers in virtually every country face an array of threats, and only through our active involvement can we ensure their health in the years ahead.
The Regional Project Officer was part of the GWPWA team that participated in the GWP Regional Days. She took part on May 11, 2016 at the IDMP session that brought togetjer the Global progarmme Manager and the regional programmes managers of Eastern Africa and Central and Eastern Europe to discuss the challenges, difficulties and especially the added value of IDMP in each region.
Nepal has vast water resources and approximately 67% of its cultivated land can be irrigated. Out of the 1.7 million ha of Nepal’s irrigable land, 78% has been provided with some irrigation infrastructure. Irrigation is vital to Nepal, especially as the country is facing climate change impacts such as rise in temperature and more erratic rainfall patterns, which is creating prolonged periods of droughts and jeopardising the agricultural production nationwide. As the supply of water for agriculture becomes more variable, water resource competition and water conflicts across the country are equally becoming increasingly visible. The Bajrabarahi Village Municipality is one of those rural communities where water conflicts have been clearly on the rise over the last decade.
Building up from previous awareness raising activities organized in the framework of the youth initiative run by the Global Water Partnership - Mediterranean (GWP-Med) in Tunisia aimed at making the youth’s voice heard in water resources management and climate change adaptation, and putting more emphasis on the potential of interactive games for awareness raising among youth audiences, a two-day training was organized on Aqua Republica Serious Game by the NGO “Recherche en Action” (REACT), in collaboration with the NGO “Tunisian Education and Resource Network” (TEARN).
Nepal is particularly vulnerable to climate change impacts for a variety of environmental, social, and economic reasons. Average temperatures have been rising steadily since the 1970s. Most of the mountain ranges within Nepal are home to extensive glaciers which are experiencing widespread retreat. Glacial discharge in turn impacts the hydrological regimes of rivers downstream and causes rapid growth of glacial lakes; glacier lake outburst floods (GLOFs) are one of many climate change phenomena with the potential to pose extreme risk to populations, infrastructure, etc.