Ordinary Thematic Session

New models and mechanisms that inspire and reward utilities for thinking outside of their government budget need to be implemented alongside new methods for financing water and sanitation service provision

Scaling up water financing is needed, especially in emerging and developing countries. Blended Finance can play an important role in that matter. This session sheds light on the main attributes that are commonly associated with successful Blended Finance projects in the water sector, distinguishing between grid systems under scope of water utilities and off grid ones, while looking to identify how the different actors can contribute to scale it up in the sector.

But how does the private sector cooperate effectively with women to help address gender inequity in water and sanitation and what lessons are being learned.

As the syntheses of various measures and recommendations, it is necessary to strengthen the following four pillars:
? Science and technology: to accelerate policy implementation and monitoring processes;

Access to sanitation remains a key issue for millions of people. 2.4 billion still lack access to basic sanitation, and 1.2 billion of these live in fragile or extremely fragile contexts. The COVID-pandemic only disclosed the fragility of the achievements by various stakeholders so far and highlights the importance of collaboration among WASH, health, and environment sectors for sustainable results.

Key opportunities through innovative funding mechanisms to implement North-South, South-South and Triangular water cooperation to improve access to water and sanitation for all.

Capacity development is permanently necessary in all the institutions in charge of the management of water services or water resources. Cooperation between academic or training organizations can bring interesting experience sharing inputs and accelerate both the dissemination of scientific and technical knowledge as well as operational practices.

The session will try to highlight the needs for the academia and WASH operational bodies to get closer together and engage cooperation for a better development of the WASH sector in Africa and show why one needs the other, even for its own development. The session will give the opportunity to assess what was done these past years to really link research & development to operational needs of the Africa WASH sector.

Adaptation to climate change requires a strong knowledge of its impacts, especially on water resources and related ecosystems: we cannot manage what we do not know.
The current Sentinel / Copernicus constellation, the upcoming SWOT and TRISHNA mission can be combined to build knowledge regarding rainfall, discharge and evaporation. More generally, “multi-sensor” satellite data can be mobilized, since these data are essential for water resource management and climate change adaptation.

This section aims to discuss how multipurpose dams are adapting to changes caused by climate change and the increasing pressure from different water uses. This involves discussions on how different management approaches, including adaptative strategies, available instruments (standards) and other mechanisms can contribute to meeting future demands for energy security, sustainability and resilience of multi-purpose infrastructures and water security.