Vientiane, 22 October 2018 -- A pre Steering Commitee Meeting was held in the Mekong River Commission (MRC) Secretariat on 22 October 2018 to discuss several important agenda for the upcoming event in the Q4. Involving 13 participants that represent the Country Water Partnership's Chair, GWP SEA Chairman and the Secretariat, as well as GWPO representatives, this event was back to back with the Regional Shared Vision Planning & Collaborative Modelling Training and Workshop which also held in Vientiane, Lao PDR.

80 participants – comprised of Green Climate Fund (GCF) National Designated Authorities (NDAs), GCF Direct Access Entities (DAEs), and decision makers in Water Ministries and agencies – from 18 countries across Central Asia & the Caucasus, South Asia, South East Asia and China attended a Technical Workshop on Project Preparation for Transformational Climate Resilient Water Project Concepts for the Green Climate Fund at the Asian Development Bank in Manila on 15-16 October.

GWP is hosting a Pan-Asia Regional training on Water Governance, International Water Law and Multi-Stakeholder Processes together with partner organisations. The training takes place in Kunming, China, 13-15 December 2018.

Water is one of the most basic human needs and is now currently facing multifaceted complexity. From depleted ground aquifers to polluted river, water has been for quite some time under pressures due to urbanization, population growth, industrialization and so forth.

Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Mechanism was proposed by Chinese Primer Likeqiang ni the 17th China-ASEAN Leaders’ meeting held in November of 2015, which aims to strengthen all-round and friendly cooperation among China and Mekong countries and promote regional overall development. The First Lancang-Mekong (LMC) Foreign Ministers Meeting held in Jinghong, Yunnan Province of China in November of 2015 formally announced the establishment of the LMC Mechanism.

On December 11 and 12, 2017, the GWP Pan-Asian delegation formed by members of GWPO, GWP CASENA Region, GWP China Region, GWP SAS Region and GWP SEA Region participated into the 3rd APWS and organized a thematic session during the Summit in Yangon, Myanmar.

Asia and the Pacific has made impressive progress towards achieving several sustainable development goals including poverty alleviation, education and economic growth. At the same time, the region needs to accelerate concerted efforts across all sectors to achieve the SDGs by 2030. In the face of transboundary challenges such as climate change and natural disasters, energy security and connectivity, ecosystem degradation on land and in our oceans, and promoting sustainable equitable trade, regional cooperation can support and complement the effectiveness of national mechanisms and be a link between global goals and country level commitments.

Water is the interconnector of all other sectors; Therefore, it is not possible to support sectors development without understanding the role of water as one of the important development foundation. As important as it is, water is still considered as social goods and do not have value by development actors. This condition has created a very complex challenge for the development of water sector itself. In Asia Pacific region, the complexities of water challenges then urged the establishment of The Asia-Pacific Water Forum (APWF) in Asia Pacific region.

Bangkok, Thailand (12/8/2017). Southeast Asia is particularly vulnerable to climate change for several reasons. First and foremost, in many of these countries large portions of the population live in poverty. The proportion of the population living below the poverty line ranges from the lowest in Thailand at 10.2% to 53% in Lao PDR (ADB 2008). The poor are particularly vulnerable to climate change, as they lack the resources necessary for many types of adaptive actions. With its extensive coastlines, Southeast Asia is also home to many millions of people living at low elevations that are at risk from sea level rise. Moreover, ongoing social and environmental challenges in the region – notably growing income inequality, rising food prices, and widespread deforestation – contribute to social vulnerability and make climate change more likely to bring significant harms.

Chairs, Regional Coordinators, Programme Managers of Water, Climate and Development Programme (WACDEP), Senior Network Officers for Pan Asia met in Colombo, Sri Lanka on 12 and 13 September 2017 to develop the Pan Asia WACDEP Strategy document 2017-2019.