Transcript Transboundary Water Cooperation & Climate change

Transboundary Water
Cooperation & Climate change
Some important points
Setting the stage
• Nile Basin
– Governments have to deal with many issues and CC has to
find its place in the priority order (MDGs, Poverty…)
– Institutional issues are constraining transboundary
cooperation (Cooperative Framework Agreement, NBI
transforms to a River Basin Authority ? )
• Zambezi Basin
– Institutional issues – ZAMCOM is about to be established
and will be a vehicle to implement IWRM (incl. CC
considerations)
– Water resources issues in Zambezi are more quality
oriented than quantity oriented
Setting the stage
• Regional Climate Change Programme (SADC)
– Sub-regional priority mapping based on
population pressure, economies, institutions,
infrastructure and CC parameters
– CC is an important fator in regional security
• Mekong Basin
– Integration of national and regional CC adaptation
strategies needed
– Important to share information and knowledge –
MRC is a vehicle for sharing
Setting the stage
• Egypt’s perspective
– Egypt depends totally on the Nile, which has a
high sensitivity to CC
– Uncertainties in application of Global Climate
Models is large – predictions for the Nile flows
ranges froma 30% increase to a 78% decrease
Key note addresses
• DIIS Research on 5 small basins
– Local level conflict studies indicate that the
number of conflictive and cooperative events are
almost the same – at the moment…but CC may
change this
– A trusted mediator is important in a conflict
situation
Key note addresses
• Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR)
– The need for more emphasis on DRR is intensified
by CC
– Opportunity costs following a non-DRR approach
need to be brought out clearly
– Droughts are the most important natural disasters
in economic, social and environmental terms
Key note addresses
• UNECE experience – laid down in Guideline
– Information management incl. joint information
generation and uncertainties
– Financing systems are essential incl public and private
adaptation funds, insurance, sharing of costs and
benefits basinwide
• Floods - migration as a CC adaptation
– Strategies necessitated by ”higher global population,
environmental degradation increase incl CC, increase
in national disasters”
– Important to understand the factors leading to
migration looking for other means of living
Group discussions
• Three themes were discussed in terms of
Lessons learned (looking back) and
Recommendations (charting the way ahead)
– Institutional roles in relation to CC
– Policy development at transboundary level to
address CC
– Actions and tools for CC and DRR
• Discussions were reported in plenary followed
by plenary discussions and a panel discussion