Three-day AWC First General Assembly-Summary Report
Reported by HE Mr. Watt Botkosal
Regional Chair, GWPSEA on 30 March 2016
The 1st Asia Water Council General Assembly was hosted and Co-organized by Ministry of Public Works and Housing and AWC Secretariat on 24-26 March 2016, Nusa Dua Beach Hotel and Spa, Bali, Indonesia. The AWC was established by 15 Founders of Countries and international Agencies since the 7th World Water Week in Korea. The AWC aims to raise global awareness of Asia’s water problems and promote the sustainable development of Asia by resolving regional water issues. The General Assembly aimed to discuss the AWC Constitution and the operation plan for the AWC and to share the commitments from Founders. The General Assembly was attended by about 200 participants from about 50 organizations including Minister, Vice-Minister, Directors General, Directors, Chairpersons, AWC Secretariat, national and international organizations from Asia, Europe, Africa, and Australia such as UNESCO-IHP, FAO, and ADB (Asian Development Bank), KOICA, Representative of GWP SEA, Country Water Partnership of Indonesia, national agencies etc.
Within the framework of the celebration of the International Youth Day 2016 under the theme “The Road to 2030: Eradicating Poverty and Achieving Sustainable Consumption and Production”, some leaders of Cameroon Youth organizations involved in protecting the environment launched on the 13th of August the process of the establishment of a network entitled “Youth network for wetlands”.
This launching was made during a workshop on the approval of the logical framework document of the network.
The workshop itself was organized by Water For Life Cameroon with the support of GWP-CAf. It took place at the GWP-CAf Secretariat in Yaounde, Cameroon.
20 leaders from 10 youth organizations such as Water For Life Cameroon (W4L), Women In Development (WID), Jeunes Volontaires de l’Environnement (JVE), Centre de Recherche sur la Forêt et l’Environnement, Institut des Relations Internationales du Cameroun (IRIC), AJEVOH Cameroun, Cameroon Youth Initiative for Rural Development (CAMYIRD), Young Professional Platform for Agricultural Development (YPARD), United Voice to Serve Forest and Environment (USFE) attended the meeting.
During this meeting, Global Water Partnership Central Africa (GWP-CAf) shared its experiences on networking: GWP as a multi-players network with a vision and mission. This presentation aimed at strengthening the participants’ understanding of the structure and function of the network they wanted to establish in order to mutualize their effort in protecting the wetlands and underlining the benefits the communities will obtain from wetlands and also guiding youth leaders as a compass in networking.
On July 1, 2016, Dr. Oyun Sanjaasuren assumes the role of new Chair of the Global Water Partnership (GWP): "I think those who set up GWP 20 years ago - the people, organisations, governments - were very visionary and had good foresight. It is only more recently that water and water governance gained wider understanding and support”. Dr. Oyun says that now is a crucial time for GWP to influence the global development agenda.
Conventions have been with the CWP of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger to allow the implementation of pilot projects in the countries during 2016 and continue the consultation meetings of national and regional platforms in the area of Integrated Drought Management.
The Project Manager has seized the opportunity and visited the pilot villages in the rural town of Gouendo in Mali where Mr. Boureima DIARRA, the mayor of the rural town said that "It is always better to teach us how to fish than to give us the fish".
The Global Water Partnership-Caribbean (GWP-C) has done some major updates to its Caribbean Water and Climate Knowledge Platform which was developed under its Water, Climate and Development Programme (WACDEP) in 2014.