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"The Mékrou Project, which will test and correct our various national tools for integrated management of water resources is a vast field of institutional, technical and technological innovations and scientific research in order to better understand the resource and establish a real sustainable plan for its use." It is in these terms that the Secretary General of the Ministry of Water, Water Facilities and Sanitation of Burkina Faso, Mr. Ali TRAORÉ, spoke at the official launch of the project. He expressed himself on behalf of the Honourable Minister and noted the importance of the new project on March 18, 2014 in Ouagadougou.

Technical knowledge about water resources management, written by the GWP Technical Committee.

What differentiates IWRM from traditional water management approaches is the idea that water security can only be reached if different sectors that use water resources share information and collaborate on management issues. Another major difference is the meaningful involvement of stakeholders in the decision-making and implementation process. Both of these are impossible to achieve without communication. But the more diverse the actors are, the more likely they are to misunderstand each other or to pursue different kinds of interests, and the more communication specifically for conflictive situations might be needed. Communication is fundamental to any kind of success in IWRM.

Many dialogues and seminars on river pollution have been organised over the past 20 years. Generally there is an agreement that countries desperately need to do something about the sad state of rivers, especially in countries which hope to achieve developed nation status by 2020.

A proper enabling environment establishes the rights and assets of all stakeholders (individuals as well as public and private sector organizations and companies, women as well as men, the poor as well as the better off), while ensuring for environmental quality. The enabling environment essentially consists of “rules of the game” that are laid out as to achieve a sustainable balance between the social, economic and environmental needs for water. These rules can be defined by the use of: (1) Policies; (2) Legislative Frameworks; and (3) Financing and Investment Structures.

In December, GWP Honduras helped organise a workshop on IWRM to contribute to the development of the annual plan for the management of rural water systems in southern Honduras.

The Khimti 1 Hydropower Project was initiated to increase hydropower supply in Nepal. Action was taken to carry out an Environmental Impact Assessment to identify promotion of livelihood, economic enhancement and social well being of the project area communities. The project formulated an Environmental Monitoring Plan as well as environmental mitigation and monitoring programme. The key lesson to learn is the importance of assessment prior to the development of any project. 

The Veluwe Randmeren lakes in the Netherlands were negatively affected by the discharge of phosphates and nitrates from agriculture and household use. Furthermore, increase in population pressure posed further challenges. To address these issues, a group consisting of national and local authorities undertook a project, which gradually increased the water quality. The case study demonstrates the importance of allowing integration among stakeholder groups. 

The South African Country Water Partnership (SACWP) was first launched in 2002 at a time when the Department of Water Affairs was heavily engaging with different stakeholders for implementing its 1998 new water law. Since the launch, there have been a number of attempts to revive the CWP.

• Between 2005 and 2008, various attempts were made to rekindle the interest in the CWP primarily in the academic sector, all of which bore little to no fruit.
• The last push to revive the CWP was in 2009 by the then interim chair of the CWP.
  In 2012 a new promising re-launch is started. Read more on the re-establishment