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GWP participated in a meeting of the Inter-American Network of Academies of Sciences (IANAS) in Lima 2-4 December 2013. The topic was urban water management, and the meeting enabled advances in the elaboration of the IANAS book “Urban water in the Americas”, to be launched later this year.

Sixth meeting of Task Force on Water and Climate (Convention of the Protection and Use of  Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes) was held in Geneva, Switzerland, on 27 June 2013.

GWP SA’s Executive Secretary, Ms Ruth Beukman joined other key stakeholders at the much awaited Limpopo Watercourse Commission (LIMCOM) Official Launch which was held at Maputo, Mozambique on July 24^th 2014. The launch of LIMCOM follows the finalisation of the process of ratification of the Agreement for the establishment of LIMCOM.  

Right at the heart of Namibia, “the land of the brave”, in the capital Windhoek was the venue for the 7th SADC Multi- stakeholder Water Dialogue held from the 29th to the 30th of September, 2015. Held under the theme, “Watering Development in SADC: The central role of water in driving industrialization” the dialogue was attended by 150 delegates from across the region representing the water sector, Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), cooperating and development partners, academia, the media, and other relevant stakeholders from non-water entities (energy, agriculture, industrialization). The delegates, of which a good number were youth were brought together to deliberate the role that water will play in driving industrialization in the region.

Water governance remains a key challenge in the Mediterranean. Efforts of countries focus on improving policies making and action planning, institutional settings, law and regulation, enforcement mechanisms, innovative financing, application of cost recovery and polluter pays principle, etc. To achieve sustainable models of development, water must be mainstreamed into other sectoral policies such as agriculture, land planning and use, energy, industry, tourism and trade. Political will is key for making these happen. The importance of cross-cutting issues, such as gender, equity, poverty and rights, is increasingly recognized but is still relatively poorly tackled.

The farmers in the Volta river basin generally rely on rain-fed agriculture. However, insufficient or irregular rainfall frequently puts farmers at risk of losing their crops. Farmers must have access to a reliable water supply to sustain their livelihoods. In line with the problems highlighted, the Challenge Program on Water and Food (CPWF) set out to find ways to strengthen the capacity of the famers, communities and other stake holders in the basin. As a lesson learnt, it is reasonable to expect stakeholders to adopt improved agricultural practices if such new practices are of their own benefit. Experiences show that stakeholders will only participate in innovation platform meetings when they see the value of doing so.

14 April 2014, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia: Climate change adaptation is the focus of high-level regional training and knowledge exchange in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia this month. African government ministerial representatives from more than 30 least developed African countries are meeting to consider National Adaptation Plan (NAP)require-ments, which aim to address the long–term climate change challenges for Africa.

Regional Day- Global Water Partnership, South Asia

Side Event: “From Risk to Resilience: South Asia Regional Framework for Sustainable Water Management

The GWP network celebrated World Water Day 2015 with a string of events throughout the world, from Central America to China. This a summary of some of the highlights, with links to reports.

Vanh Mixap from Laos and Elisabeth Tarigan from Indonesia have been awarded the GWP-Ken Thiess Scholarship with the International WaterCentre (IWC) in Australia.