3-4 July 2017, OECD Conference Centre, Paris
On 3-4 July 2017, the OECD Water Governance Initiative held its 9th meeting at OECD Headquarters in Paris. The meeting gathered 115+ practitioners, policymakers and representatives from major stakeholder groups. The agenda, list of participants, slides and pictures from the event are accessible online.
KEY OUTCOMES
Delegates shared opportunities to foster the implementation of global frameworks (SDG 6 [water]; Paris Agreement), notably on the road to the 8th World Water Forum to be held in Brasilia, Brazil (2018). Delegates were invited to take part in the “Your Voice” online consultation on the Governance stream of the 8th World Water Forum, which is open until 16 July, and to the regional consultation on the Valuing Water initiative carried out under the High-Level Panel on Water convened to contribute to the implementation of SDG6.
Members welcomed the revised water governance indicator framework as a user-driven self-assessment tool for interested countries and stakeholders on the OECD Principles on Water Governance. Valuable suggestions were provided by the pilot-testers from Austria, Cabo Verde, Colombia, Morocco, Netherlands, Peru, Spain, UK (Scotland) and RD Congo (GWP) to clarify the distinction between management and governance indicators and to engage in next steps for data collection in interested countries, basins and cities for the forthcoming OECD Water Governance at a Glance publication.
Delegates welcomed the 69 water governance stories that were collected to illustrate how the OECD Principles can be implemented at different levels, and highlight results achieved and lessons learned during policy and reform processes. They agreed to peer-review the stories as part of policy dialogues to foster experience-sharing and peer-learning.
Knowledge and information were shared on i) recent research focusing on revitalising the IWRM paradigm, water service regulation, governance of water infrastructure in Chile, and water governance in humanitarian contexts; ii) recent events (4th Istanbul International Water Forum, IWRA World Congress, Water Economics Forum, 3rd Asia-Pacific Water Summit); and iii) ongoing projects and policy developments in Israel, MENA countries and on groundwater governance.
Delegates peer-reviewed draft assessments and recommendations from the OECD-Brazil Policy Dialogue on “Setting and Governing Economic Instruments for Water Resources Management”, and from OIEau’s ECOCUENCAS project on the role of economic and governance instruments in climate change adaptation in 3 basins of Peru, Ecuador and Brazil, in the presence of high-level delegations from Brazil’s National Water Agency and PCJ river basin committee.
A session was devoted to water governance in France to share experience on recent environmental and territorial reforms, with a special focus on issues related to policy coherence between water and biodiversity, basin governance, and the consolidation of water service operators.
Detailed Policy Highlights from the meeting will be shared with WGI members by 28 July for written comments. The final version will be available online on 25 August. The OECD-WGI will hold its 10th Meeting on 20-21 November 2017 in Vienna, Austria.
The OECD Water Governance Initiative is a multi-stakeholder network of 100+ delegates from public, private and non-profit sectors gathering twice a year in a Policy Forum to share on-going reforms, projects, lessons and good practices in support of better governance in the water sector. It was launched on 27-28 March 2013 and is chaired by Peter Glas of the Dutch Water Authorities. The WGI is hosted by the OECD, and coordinated by a multi-stakeholder steering committee (see below logos). For more information, please contact water.governance@oecd.org
