News and Activities

More than 55% of India’s population is practicing agriculture in climate sensitive areas; 53% of the area suffers from serious degradation; 30 million hectares of land experience haphazard grazing and the fall in per capita availability of water is 70 percentage points.

To stimulate new thinking to improve Sri Lanka’s natural resources management, the first Young Water Professionals Symposium for the country was organized by GWP Sri Lanka in association with IWMI and Unilever on 22-23 November in Colombo with the participation of the Hon Minister of Water Supply and Drainage Dinesh Gunawardene and Prof Mohan Munasinghe, Nobel Peace Prize winner 2007 (IPCC), and over 150 participants.

The Technical Report on issues related to water and agriculture in South Asia authored by GWP South Asia was launched recently.

GWP South Asia, in collaboration with the Asia Pacific Adaptation Network, has published a report on Issues related to Water and Agriculture in South Asia to help improve the exchange of information on water resources management and climate change adaptation among South Asian countries and pave the way for improved cooperation and policy reform.

Stakeholder consultation has led to improved services from the Nepal Water Supply Corporation – Biratnagar (NWSCB) that serves 10,000 households. 

GWP Sri Lanka's Area Water Partnership in Nilwala helped resolve a contentious issue that had long affected the area. 

The new national water policy has now been approved by the Government of India. 

The reputation of the Halda River in Chittagong District as the most important breeding ground for carp fry in Bangladesh has been largely restored through interventions by the Halda River Area Water Partnership.

To increase awareness about key critical issues related to climate change challenges that Bangladesh is likely to face in the future, a training on “Climate Change Adaptation” was organized by the Institute of Water Modeling (IWM) and GWP Bangladesh, on 23-25 September 2012 in Dhaka.

“Water is a thread that runs through every development sector. The land and water of Sri Lanka is our oil and our gold… We can no longer afford to make water a sectoral matter. We cannot make it someone else’s business.” These were some of the comments made by Ms Kusum Athukorala, Chair of the Sri Lanka Water Partnership at a felicitation ceremony conducted to honour her achievement on receiving the bi-annual Women in Water Award presented by the International Water Association.