The Mediterranean basin ranks among the first in the list of the world top tourist destinations. Tourism activity registers annually around 250 million visitors and the number of domestic and international tourists should reach 637 million by 2025. It is estimated that every tourist consumes between 300 and 850 liters of water per day.
GWP Patron Margaret Catley-Carlson delivered the keynote speech at this year's Asia Development Bank’s (ADB) water conference held October 11-15, 2010 in Manila, Philippines. Her focus was on “cutting through red tape in order to achieve better water security.” The GWP delegation participated in a variety of sessions and gave presentations.
Costa Rica is making progress in expanding access to water supply and sanitation, but the sector faces challenges when it comes to sanitation connections, poor service quality, and low cost recovery.
In September, the Coca Cola Foundation approved funding for the GWP Mediterranean project on ‘Rainwater Harvesting in the Cyclades Islands’. The project aims to contribute to local water security through a pilot installation of more than 10 rainwater harvesting systems in public buildings, training of technicians, and educational activities for local schools.
An interregional workshop on “Women and Water Management” was held in Guatemala in October, organised by UNESCO and supported by GWP Guatemala, GWP Central America and GWP South America. (Photo: Participants at the workshop)
GWP Romania participated at the Bucharest Business Forum at the World Trade Center, Bucharest, Romania on 18-19 October 2010. The goal was to offer a discussion platform for all stakeholders interested in developing flagship projects within the EU Strategy for Danube Region through Strategic Partnerships at European macro regional level.
GWP Executive Secretary Dr Ania Grobicki participated in a meeting of the Integrated Flood Management HelpDesk,with WMO and other Support Base Partners (SBPs) in Geneva on 4 and 5 October - to discuss achievements so far and what can be done in the future. Since the HelpDesk´s launch in June 2009, 26 requests from 14 countries have so far been received, and dealt with in various different ways depending on the level of the request.
The challenges China is facing with the rapid growth of urban centres, and the corresponding demands on limited water and related resources, is immense. This is true on the Loess Plateau which covers an area of some 640,000 km² in the upper and middle of China's Yellow River. A workshop on “Efficient Use of Water Resources and Ecological Compensation” was co-organized by GWP China-Yellow River and the Yellow River Research Institute on 27-28 September 2010, in Zhengzhou, Henan Province.