The Water, Climate and Development Programmes are developed by GWP Regional Water Partnerships in collaboration with relevant governments and regional economic development communities. WACDEP supports countries on the integration of water security and climate resilience in development planning and decision making processes. This is achieved through enhanced technical and institutional capacity, sustainable financing for water security, better drought/flood management, and climate change adaptation.
Objectives and Expected Results
The objective is to develop the capacity of planners and technical officers to identify, develop, and appraise no/low regrets investment options and integrate these into national, transboundary, and regional planning processes, development plans, and programmes. More specifically, this initiative aims to develop the capacities and knowledge required by planners and decision makers and to enhance their skills in the following areas:
- Making an economic case to high level policy makers on the importance of water security and climate resilient development;
- Undertaking climate impact assessment and climate screening;
- Using economic tools and methods for appraising investment options including cost-benefit analysis and cost effectiveness assessment;
- Project preparation and access to climate finance;
- Robust decision making using the concept of no/low regret investments;
- Designing of financing and investment portfolios for climate resilient development;
- Mainstreaming no/low regret investments into development planning processes;
- Monitoring and evaluation of climate resilient development.
Scope
Country trainings have taken place in eight WACDEP Africa countries: Cameroon, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Tunisia, Rwanda, Burundi, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique. Additional countries from UNDP-GEF supported adaptation projects will be included. Work will involve collaboration with GWP and UNDP regions and countries
Partners
The Capacity Development Initiative is implemented in collaboration with the following partners:
- African Ministers' Council on Water (AMCOW);
- Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN);
- UNDP-GEF;
- Cap-Net;
- NIRAS of Sweden;
- Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies;
- Centre for Environmental Economics and Policy in Africa (CEEPA);
- GWP Regional Water Partnerships;
- GWP Country Water Partnerships.
Target Audience
The primary target audience are government planners across line ministries such as Economic Planning, Finance, Water Resources, Agriculture, Environment, Energy, Health and Infrastructure. Participants include a mix of participants with and without a background in economics. The secondary target audience are researchers and practitioners from key planning agencies and institutions, GWP regional and national teams, UNDP Least Developed Countries Fund (LDCF) Project Coordinators, Regional Economic Communities, River Basin Organizations, Development Banks, Non-Governmental Organizations and others.
Delivery Methods
So far the structure of the capacity building activities under this initiative has been built on the Strategic Framework for Water Security and Climate Resilient Development designed by the African Union and AMCOW with support from GWP and CDKN. Workshops are centered around an iterative, cyclical decision-making process split into four phases as follows: (1) Understand the problem; (2) Identify and appraise options; (3) Deliver solutions and (4) Monitor and move forward. The training sessions are further complemented by knowledge management and experience sharing including research on priority issues related to economic appraisal and investment definition.