UNESCO-IHP, the Chirac Foundation and the French Development Agency team up for conference on water and peace

While the global amount of water remains unchanged, global changes are putting pressure on these fragile resources.  The world’s population is increasing exponentially, and it is predicted that by 2050, 9 billion people will inhabit our planet.  Migrations from rural to urban areas, urbanization as well as the impacts of climate change are putting even more pressure on the water resources.

The conference on "Water for Peace – Peace for Water : Lessons from the Past and Current Challenges", jointly organized by UNESCO’s International Hydrological Programme and the Fondation Chirac, with the support of AFD (Agence Française de Développement), will address these issues with 2 roundtables, on 13 November 2008, from 9:30am to 1pm.

The Conference will bring together distinguished speakers from international organizations and NGOs, policy makers, journalists from different regions of the world.

Its aim is to provide a high-level, multi-stakeholder forum to discuss new challenges in transboundary water conflicts and cooperation as well as management of water in fragile states.

The outcome of the roundtable deliberations will also contribute to the Political Process of the 5th World Water Forum, to be held in Istanbul from 15 to 22 March 2009.

The roundtable will be held in English and French.

Conference website and programme

PCCP website

Please register on the website of the Fondation Chirac or at the following email address: conference@fondationchirac.eu.
Attendance: Free, by pre-registration only.
Venue: UNESCO Fontenoy, Room I.

For more information, please contact Ms Marie-Laure Vercambre: Tel:  +33 (0)1 47 42 87 78

International Conference on Groundwater & Climate in Africa releases Kampala Statement

The impact of climate variability and change on groundwater resources remains poorly understood and is one of the most persistent knowledge gaps identified by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in both its 3rd (2001) and 4th (2007) Assessment Reports. The common exclusion of groundwater from current monitoring and evaluations of the impacts of climate variability and change is of particular concern in Africa where approximately half of its nearly one billion inhabitants rely upon groundwater for their daily water supply. Furthermore, future adaptations in response to climate change and rapid population growth are expected to intensify dependence upon groundwater in Africa in order to improve access to safe water and adequate sanitation.

Within the seventh phase of UNESCO’s International Hydrological Programme (2008-2013) one of the five themes aims to improve the management of groundwater systems’ responses to global changes. The organization of the International Conference on Groundwater & Climate in Africa was one of the activities carried out in the framework of IHP VII.

The Kampala conference, constituted a landmark - it was the first-ever meeting to discuss the role of groundwater in improving livelihoods in Africa under conditions of rapid development and climate change. Organized jointly with the Ministry of Water & Environment (Uganda), and the University College London (UK), the Groundwater & Climate in Africa conference brought together more than 300 water scientists, managers and policy makers from 23 countries in Africa and 14 countries from the rest of the world. The active participation of a dozen parliamentarians and several ministers from Uganda, Ethiopia and the Government of Southern Sudan was particularly meaningful, as this dialogue between politicians and scientists is crucial: the sustainable management of groundwater in Africa will be reliant on strong national institutions and legal frameworks.

With over 20 hours of dedicated discussion time that culminated in two round-table discussions, participants were able to translate scientific and policy-related research findings into concrete technical and policy recommendations, summarised in the Kampala Statement, for national governments in Africa, regional, basin-wide and transboundary organisations as well as international fora including the 5th World Water Forum and Copenhagen Climate Summit in 2009.

Conference Website

Kampala Statement

UNESCO publishes first world map of underground transboundary aquifers

UNESCO is publishing the first-ever world map of shared aquifers to coincide with the submission to the General Assembly of the United Nations on 27 October of a draft Convention on Transboundary Aquifers. Almost 96% of the planet’s freshwater resources are to be found in underground aquifers, most of which straddle national boundaries.

Despite its strategic importance, no global inventory of this resource had been compiled to date. Since 2000, UNESCO’s International Hydrological Programme (IHP) has been participating in the establishment of a groundwater database. It is now presenting a detailed map of transboundary aquifers – available online – showing the delineations of aquifers that are shared by at least two countries. It also provides information about the quality of their water and rate of replenishment. So far, the inventory comprises 273 shared aquifers: 68 are on the American continent, 38 in Africa, 65 in eastern Europe, 90 in western Europe and 12 in Asia.

Full article

Euromediterranean Network of Experimental and Representative Basins (ERB) hold bi-annual meeting and names new International Coordinator

ERB held its 12th bi-annual conference from 17 to 20 September 2008 in Krakow, Poland. Organized by Jagiellonian University Institute of Geography and Spatial Management, this conference was convened in collaboration with FRIEND Project 5 and also in conjunction with International Association of Hydrological Sciences’ (IAHS) PUB initiative.

The conference, entitled "Hydrological Extremes in Small Basins" was highly successful with over 100 papers appearing in the book of abstracts edited by Wojciech Chelmicki and Janusz Siwcki.

The 13th ERB conference will be organized in 2010 in Austria by Hubert Holzmann of the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Science (BOKU), Vienna.

After a period of six years having been closely involved in four ERB conferences, Piet Warmerdam is retiring as ERB International Coordinator. The ERB SC meeting of 17 September 2008 and the ERB General Assembly of 20 September 2008 nominated unanimously Ladislav Holko of the Institute of Hydrology Slovak Academy of Science as the new ERB International Coordinator for a period of four years. Ladislav Holko is well known and highly esteemed in the ERB and FRIEND communities. He acquired the full support of the Slovak IHP National Committee for this nomination. Pavol Miklanek will remain the ERB National Correspondent of the Slovak Republic.

Conference Website

Call for contributions of art work, poems or songs for a book targeting children and youth: Join us in our celebration of water!

What do you think of water? Do you like drawing pictures or writing poems? Join us in our celebration of diverse cultural perspectives on water, to help us respect the lifeblood that connects us all.

UNESCO-IHP project on Water and Cultural Diversity is looking for contributions to be compiled into a book targeting children and youth.

Read more

Water Footprint Network founded

The water footprint of a nation is the volume of water needed for the production of the goods and services consumed by its inhabitants. The idea of the water footprint is quite similar to the ecological footprint, but focusing on the use of water.

The Water Footprint Network originates from research started by Prof. Arjen Hoekstra at UNESCO-IHE in 2000, which resulted in an international team of researchers led by Hoekstra estimating the size of the ‘water footprints’ of nations. The network will aim to find broadly shared standards on water footprint accounting. Transparent standards are necessary to enable communication about water footprints of consumers and producers, to make sure that all stakeholders speak ‘the same language’. These shared standards will also be key in finding measures to reduce the negative impacts of water footprints.

The seven founding partners of the Water Footprint Network are major global players in the field of water: UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education, the University of Twente, WWF-the global conservation organization, the Water Neutral Foundation, the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, the International Finance Corporation (part of the World Bank Group) and the Netherlands Water Partnership.

Network Website

Full press release

Call for papers: Regional Workshop on Water and Education in Latin America and the Caribbean

The International Hydrological Programme of UNESCO in representation of the Conference Organizers is making a call for papers for oral presentations for the Regional Workshop on Water and Education in Latin America and the Caribbean, to take place 11-12 December 2008, in Asunción, Paraguay.

Background and objectives

The workshop is organized within the frameworks of the International Hydrological Programme of UNESCO and of the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development and is a preparatory event for the 5th Water World Forum. One of its objectives is to highlight the importance of Education at different levels and raise awareness on the importance of water in the human life.

This workshop will provide an opportunity to document best practices in Water Education at different levels in the region, in order to subsequently promote the dissemination and adaptation of such practices through the preparation of recommendations. The Conference will also provide an opportunity to link different levels of Education and provide recommendations to advance Water Education in the Region.

Background and objectives

1. Tertiary Education and professional development of water scientist, engineers, managers and decision makers.
2. Education and Training of Water Technicians.
3. Water Education in Schools.
4. Community Education.
5. Water Education for mass-media professionals.

Presentations focusing on applied research, experiences and lessons learned are particularly welcome.

Abstracts

Deadline: Abstracts are to be submitted by 10 November 2008 to aye@unesco.org.uy

Call for papers announcement

UNW-DPC releases results of "Drinking Water Loss Reduction. Developing Capacity for Applying Solutions" conference

UN-Water Decade Programme on Capacity Development (UNW-DPC) and United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) organized from 3 to 5 September 2008 the International Workshop on "Drinking Water Loss Reduction: Developing Capacity for Applying Solutions", held at the UN Campus in Bonn, Germany. More than 60 participants, including water managers and water decision makers from 18 cities around the world confronted with the problem of drinking water losses, met in Bonn to share their experiences regarding technical, political and administrative solutions and capacity development tools.

Full press release

International Center on Qanats & Historic Hydraulic Structures conducts training course

According to an agreement signed between the Iranian ministries of Energy and gahad Agriculture, the water experts of these ministries all over the country participated in a training course on qanat technology. This course was organized by ICQHS and the Institute of High Education on Water and Electricity Industry. In this regard, the first national training course on qanat for the experts of Ministry of Agriculture was held on 18 October 2008. This short course lasted one week during which 20 experts were trained on the technology and principles of maintenance and rehabilitation of qanat. A complementary course will also be held for this group in the future.

ICQHS Website

Access a complete list of water events around the world

• Water is used by industry in a myriad of ways: for cleaning, heating and cooling; for generating steam; for transporting dissolved substances or particulates; as a raw material; as a solvent; and as a constituent part of the product itself (e.g. in the beverage industry).
• The water withdrawals for industry are:
  • World: 22% of total water use.
  • High-income countries: 59% of total water use.
  • Low-income countries: 8% of total water use.
• Industries based on organic raw materials are the most significant contributors to the organic pollutant load with the food sector being the most important polluter. The contribution of the food sector to the production of organic water pollutant is:
  • High income countries: 40%
  • Low-income countries: 54%
• In developing countries, 70% of industrial wastes are dumped untreated into waters where they pollute the usable water supply.
• The annual water volume used by industry will rise from 752 km≥/year in 1995 to an estimated 1,170 km≥/year in 2025.
• In 2025, the industrial component is expected to represent about 24% of total freshwater withdrawal.
• Of major concern are the situations in which the industrial discharge is returned directly into the water cycle without adequate treatment. If the water is contaminated with heavy metals, chemicals or particulates, or loaded with organic matter, this obviously affects the quality of the receiving water body or aquifer. The toxicity levels and lack of oxygen in the water can damage or completely destroy the aquatic ecosystems downstream as well as lakes and dams, ultimately affecting riverine estuaries and marine coastal environments.
• Past mining activities caused heavy arsenic contamination of groundwater and topsoil over 40 km≥ in Nakhon Si Thammarat province, Thailand. A study commissioned by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) in 2000 concluded that the contamination would last for the next 30 to 50 years. Testing of 1,000 samples showed arsenic contamination in some groundwater wells to be 50 to 100 times higher than the World Health Organization's guideline value for drinking water (0.01 milligrams per litre).
• In 1986 a fire destroyed a chemical store in Basel, Switzerland, near the borders of France and Germany. Chemicals reached the water in the Rhine River through the plant's sewage system when huge amounts of water (10,000- 15,000 m3) were used to fight the fire. The store contained large quantities of 32 different chemicals, including insecticides and raw ingredients, and the water implications were identified through the presence of red dye in one of the substances, which turned the river red. The main wave of chemicals destroyed eels, fish and insects, as well as habitats for small animals on the riverbanks. The total eel population was destroyed for 500 kilometres downstream, from Basel in Switzerland down to Loreley in Germany. It took 3 months after the incident for the contaminant concentrations to drop to normal values.

Information from 2nd United Nations World Water Development Report 'Water, a shared responsibility', and from the 'Water and Industry' facts and figures section of the World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP) website.

- International Hydrological Programme
- World Water Assessment Programme
- UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education
- Water-related Institutes and Centres under the Auspices of UNESCO
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