Securing continuous political support for enhanced ownership, wide outreach and impact, is among the horizontal objectives of the regional project "Capacity Building Programme on Water Integrity in the Middle East and North Africa"[1]. This SIWI-led, Sida-supported, UfM-labelled programme where GWP-Med is a core regional partner, aims to develop capacities of targeted water stakeholder groups at different governance levels to improve transparency, accountability and participatory practices in water management in the MENA region. Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Palestine and Tunisia are the focus countries of this work.
The MedPartnership and ClimVar projects held their final meeting on 3-4 November 2015 in Athens, Greece to showcase the results achieved through the activities and demonstration projects implemented over the past five years or so aiming to address the main environmental challenges that Mediterranean marine and coastal ecosystems face.
GWP-Med provides technical assistance to the UfM secretariat that coordinates/supports the drafting procedure of a roadmap and associated work plan for the work of the WEG.
At the 11th GWPSA Consulting Partners held in Pretoria from 12-13th November, 2015, GWPSA Partners elected a new Chair. In line with GWPSA’s Constitution, the Chair will serve for four years. The new Chair, Dr. Kuiri F. Tjipangandjara is from Namibia. He obtained his D Sci Eng Degree in 1991 in Mineral Engineering and Chemical Metallurgy, at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Columbia University, New York City, USA.
In line with the GWP strategic thematic area on urbanisation, GWP is collaborating with AfDB – Africa Water Facility and Partners to support the region and countries in Africa to address challenges related to water management in urban areas in cities in Africa. In view of this, a capacity building workshop on IUWM was held from 25th to 28th January in Abidjan, Ivory Coast aimed at contributing to the well-being of the urban population of Africa by improving water and wastewater services through the implementation of an integrated approach.
The Global Water Partnership West Africa Secretariat has validated the document on the monitoring and planning of activities of the project intitled "Water for growth and poverty reduction in the Mekrou transboundary river basin" or Mekrou Project.
As part of the ongoing efforts to generate more interest among journalists in reporting on environmental issues, the Ghana Country Water Partnership (CWP-Ghana) has supported some members of the Federation of Environmental Journalists (FEJ) of the Ghana Institute of Journalism (GIJ) to undertake a four day field trip. This trip was organised to the Prestea-Huni Valley District in the Western Region to build the students’ capacity in Environmental Reporting. The purpose of the Field trip was to train the students’ practically on on-field data gathering and reporting methodologies. The trip was from 06th to 09th January, 2016. There were 21 participants. Leading the team was Mr Frederick Asiamah, an environmental journalist and expert from the Ghana WatSan Journalists Network (GWJN).
The Regional Coordinator visited the Ramitenga site where the Burkina WACDEP is implementing its pilot project for the demonstration of drip irrigation through solar energy to boost agricultural production.
The Regional Coordinator took part in the enlarged meeting of the African Network of Basin Organizations (ANBO) Coordination Office and to the meeting of the Project Steering Committee SITWA in Dakar, on 15 to 17 December 2015.
After a year of operation to the satisfaction of the solar installations, and in accordance with the contract, a general review of equipment installed was made, followed by a final acceptance on December 23, 2015 by the Executive Secretary.