The Hague Ministerial Declaration, signed in March 2000, identified the key challenges to achieving water security. These challenges provide the context for the World Water Assessment Programme (WWAP). The Hague Declaration reflects the public's perception of today's water problems and outlines seven water-related challenges that need to be addressed in order to achieve 'Water Security in the 21^st Century'. WWAP has adopted the same declaration as its point of departure, and has determined four additional challenges [see WWAP Challenges]

Within this UN-wide initiative, UNESCO has launched the project From Potential Conflict to Co-operation Potential (PCCP). While this effort is relevant to each of the challenges, it addresses more specifically the challenge of sharing water resources primarily from the point of view of governments, and develops decision-making and conflict prevention tools for the future.

The goal of PCCP, in accordance with the mandate of WWAP, is to render services to UNESCO's Member States and to foster co-operation between nations. It is also guided by the Organization's paramount mandate: to nurture the idea of peace in human minds.

PCCP aims to foster co-operation between stakeholders in the management of shared water resources, while helping to ensure that potential conflicts do not turn into real ones. The project focuses on the development of tools for the anticipation, prevention and resolution of water conflicts.

For its 2^nd phase, which started in January 2004, PCCP determined the following operational objectives to strengthen the capacity of its target audience in dealing with potential and actual water conflicts:

The development of educational material related to conflicts and cooperation in the field of shared water resources;
The development of appropriate institutional frameworks for the anticipation, prevention and resolution of water conflicts;
The development of methodologies for conflict prevention and resolution;
The improvement of legal tools for the management of shared water resources;
The development of a comprehensive information system on water conflicts and cooperation;
The dissemination of results and best practices.

PCCP's priority target groups are institutions and individuals that manage shared water resources. These include:

Decision-makers and diplomats who have the obligation to respect, protect and fulfill their citizens' right to water. They also have the power, through multi-track diplomacy, to mobilize public support, and the responsibility to include civil society in their decision-making.
Leading water professionals, diplomats and policy-makers who possess the capabilities to bridge the gap between governments and the public and can generate discourse on the benefits of cooperation around water resources.
Civil society networks that play a crucial role in the decision-making processes. These groups operate at the local level, where conflicts related to water resources tend to be most intense. Therefore, their influence in water management is gradually increasing.
Educators at different levels who are at the centre of training the next generation of transboundary water managers. The transfer of knowledge and experience, particularly from an interdisciplinary perspective, is essential in order to enhance future management skills.
Post-graduate students of water studies are also a principal target group for the PCCP project, as today's students will become the managers, educators and decision-makers of water resources in the future.

One critical aim of water management is to continually reconcile the opposing interests of all water users - be they individuals, enterprises, corporations, interest groups, administrative or sovereign entities. The management of water conflicts, confrontations, competitions and co-operation are thus a part of water resources management in its broadest sense. Negative interactions (such as competition, confrontations etc...) over scarce water resources can lead to tension and - in extreme situations - even conflict, should they remain unattended.

PCCP was conceived with the idea that, although shared water resources can be a source of conflict, their joint management should be strengthened and facilitated as a means of co-operation between various water users. Thus PCCP aims to demonstrate that a situation with undeniable potential for conflict can be transformed into a situation where co-operation potential can emerge. PCCP's thematic focus is on this very transition - from PC to CP.

PCCP gives priority to water conflicts which are international in nature and may cause tension or even open conflict between sovereign states. Water disputes at the local or regional (provincial) levels are addressed only if they can have an impact on international relations or when sovereign states specifically request the technical assistance of PCCP's network of experts.

A major outcome of PCCP's first phase is the publication of a series of 31 printed volumes. A number of experts from around the world were invited to investigate the field the water conflicts and cooperation field. They analyzed historical experiences, and reviewed existing legal, diplomatic and systems analysis tools, particularly with regard to their utility in resolving water-related conflicts. Case studies of successful cooperation were developed in addition to educational material.

At present PCCP is developing tools to contribute to the achievement of the operational objectives of the project. These tools are being developed within three fields: research, education and technical assistance.

The research activities concentrate on:

The development of indicators that can aid in monitoring potential conflict and potential cooperation over shared water resources;
Identifying lessons learned compiled, from a number of real-world case studies, on both the root causes of conflicts and the successful cooperation in shared surface and underground water resources. Read the Lake Titicaca case study.
The development of a decision support system capable of resolving conflicts involving sharing water, hydropower generation and flood protection.
Reviewing and assessing international groundwater law in order to contribute to the development of a viable body of legal rules of interstate behaviour as an input to the work of the UN International Law Commission (in co-operation with the ISARM initative.

Short Courses

During the first phase of PCCP, the project conceived and developed four short educational courses on 'Conflict Prevention and Cooperation in International Water Resources'. Pilot lectures of these courses were held in Maputo and Cape Town in late 2002.

The courses are currently being adapted to other regions of the world. They are presented to both participants with experience in the natural sciences and engineering fields as well as those with sociological, legal public administration and economic backgrounds.
A Latin American version has already been developed and pilot course was held in Guayaquil.
:: Read more about these courses

Long Course

On the basis of educational and research material developed since the project's inception, a formal one-year program for postgraduate students on water conflict prevention, resolution and cooperation will be created and hosted at the UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education in Delft, The Netherlands.

Electronic Game

In addition, a computer game that introduces the basics of water management and teaching the benefits of cooperation over water is being developed.

There are currently several international institutions that facilitate and help to promote cooperation in the sharing of water resources. What is needed, however, is an international facility where these institutions can coordinate their movements, share their expertise, and jointly develop tools. Recommendations to this effect were made at the Second and Third World Water Forums in The Hague, The Netherlands and Shiiga, Japan, and were reiterated in the World Water Development Report (WWDR). In an effort to answer this need, a Water Cooperation Facility (WCF) has been conceived. The Secretariat WCF is provided by UNESCO and the World Water Council. The WCF is a neutral, non-governmental alliance of institutions that are already active in the management of shared water resources. It is, however, multilateral and linked to the United Nations System. It is managed by a coalition of institutions active in the cooperative sharing of water resources. It pulls its strength from its members and puts the sum of their assets and experiences at the service of those needing support in regional or local actions. The Facility aims to reinforce already existing actions by encouraging and managing communication among player-institutions, coordinating their data and tools, supporting their objectives, and, where pertinent, evaluating their efficiency. Through these services, the Facility upholds transparency, helps avoid overlaps, and allows the achievement of fruitful partnerships.

The Facility also directly supports parties facing difficulties in managing shared water resources. Upon request of the parties, the Facility guides them to work together to diagnose the problems, defines their respective perceptions of a given situation, explores their interests, creates options for managing difficult water issues, reaches reasonable and achievable goals, produces agreements they feel ownership for, and implements these agreements. The WCF counsels the parties to explore the reconciliation of their interests before resorting to expensive and often unproductive approaches such as taking the case to court.

In order to be able to provide these services, the WCF keeps a small core staff that leverages a worldwide network of professionals, both individuals and institutions, which can be called upon to serve individual cases, however the WCF is not a court, nor is it an arbitration institution. Rather, it is an alliance that provides support for the management of shared water resources, based on an underlying principle of 'solidarity'.