Jharkhand is a new state, established in 2000, to support the rights of indigenous people to have a separate state for themselves. Jharkhand is home to many of the country’s poorest people, despite the city being located in one of the richest areas of India in terms of minerals and natural resources. Agriculture, as the sole economic activity in the area, has not been properly developed (e.g. water facilities are poor and access to upgraded and modern agriculture-based knowledge is limited) and the land is prone to severe droughts, marked only by erratic rainfalls. Therefore, starvation and malnutrition of its citizens is widespread.
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.
GWP-CAf Staff made a four days working visit to the Executive Secretariat of Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC), which took place from 22 to 25 of March 2016, in Ndjamena, Chad.
The main objective of this visit was to finalize the ToRs and tender document for the development of a project on the establishment of an Early Warning System. The visit ended with the approval of the Terms of Reference (ToR) of the project entitled “Strengthening Climate Information and Early Warning Systems (EWS) for Climate Resilient Development and Adaptation to Climate Change in the Lake Chad Basin area”.
The 6th Africa Water Week (AWW6) takes place in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania on 18-22 July. The event is convened by the African Ministers Council on Water (AMCOW) together with the African Union Commission and other development partners. GWP will convene/co-convene a number of sessions.