8th Multi-Stakeholder Forum, Athens, June 2003

Purpose: to discuss progress on different components of the EU Water Initiative (EUWI).

Attended by: representatives from the Member States, the European Commission (EC) Department for Environment and European stakeholders (Thames, Suez, WaterAid, FAN, Tearfund, WWF, Green Cross, INBO, Agence Normandie de LEau)

 Summary of discussions

1          Africa-WatSan - Lead Country: Denmark

NO progress on the Africa Water & Sanitation component. Denmark was heavily criticised for not convening a meeting of the working group.  The first meeting will be on Sunday 10 August at the Stockholm World Water Week.

2          Africa-IWRM - Lead Country: France

Progress is now being made; the first priority is international transboundary rivers. The EC has allocated 10 million Euro to develop a strategic partnership between EU and African countries on Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) and river basin management to improve governance, coordination and capacity.

10 of the following 20 river basins will be subject of an inventory, actual projects will only be on 3-5 river basins, one from each sub-region:-

Cuvelai/Etosha; Gambia; Gash; Incomati; Juba-Shibeli; Komoe; Lake Chad; Lake Natron; Lake Turkana; Limpopo; Lotagipi Swamp; Niger; Nile; Okavango; Orange; Ruvuma; Sabi; Senegal; Volta; Zambezi;

African Coordination

The EU member states are relying on AMCOW to drive the African side of the partnership.  One limitation is that there is no means of communication between AMCOW and African NGOs. FAN would like to work towards resolving this problem.

3          EECCA - Lead Countries: Denmark and Russia

Good progress so far;

• Moscow meeting in March had good NGO participation.
• Programme Document setting out the future directions has been prepared with UNECE, EAP Task Force, UNDP and UNEP and with input from stakeholders.
• The Environment Ministers at the Kiev UNECE conference welcomed the initiative.
• The strategy is to support implementation of the EECCA Environment Strategy on water, rural water will also be prioritised.
• Steering Group including NGO representatives.

4    Latin America - Lead Countries: Water Supply and Sanitation /Mexico IWRM/ Spain Extreme events/Portugal

Newer component; for each topic the lead country will report on key problems and existing initiatives to address them, implementing stakeholders will be found and structures established for debate and dissemination.

They will report on social, economic and environmental situations.

5          Mediterranean/Balkan - Lead Country: Greece

Good progress made. They have a draft Operation Plan covering the non-EU Mediterranean countries in North Africa/Middle East and South Eastern European Countries.  They are focussing on water supply and sanitation, IWRM, food and environment in fragile ecosystems and non-conventional water resources.

6          Monitoring progress on MDGs

Workshops held in Kyoto and Brussels concluded that;

• The EUWI should not establish a new global monitoring regime, but work with the Joint Monitoring Programme
• The EUWI should consider supporting the JMP, which has only 3 staff, to monitor in-country assessments of the MDGs and to build capacity in country
• AMCOW will be consulted about support needed in Africa

7              Political Framework of the EU-WI

 The proposed structure of decision-making within the EUWI was not approved. It did not give a clear role to the stakeholders or the partner and did not go far enough on rules of engagement/codes of conduct.   FAN, WWF, Agence de LEau Seine-Normandie, Thames Water, EC, Sweden and Greece were appointed to review the structure and present a new proposal to the Member States in September.

8        EU Water Fund

There has been a lot of recent publicity about a 1 billion Euro Water Fund for Africa from the European Commission. This is not new overseas Development Assistance, but is unallocated money within the EUs African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) budget. Is likely to gain political support from heads of government, but with these additions:

• Need to agree with ACP Group on allocation to water
• Need to agree on a cost-effective disbursement system