Workshop for the Drafting of Water Management Curriculum for Africa: Upscaling Water Security to Meet Local, Regional, and Global Challenges – Designing Local Ecohydrology and IWRM Educational Resources for Africa
The Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) addresses water management in a holistic manner, integrating the management of water resources with ecosystem services, human health, ecological sustainability, economic growth, poverty alleviation, gender equality, employment and other aspects of sustainable human development.
By enhancing knowledge and practice of water management in Africa using ecohydrology and IWRM through curricula development and dissemination, key stakeholders and their communities will be empowered in identifying sustainable solutions for addressing water management challenges in Africa.
The adaptation of Water Management Curricula Using Ecohydrology and Integrated Water Resources Management with African contexts is implemented under the new project “Upscaling Water Security to Meet Local, Regional, and Global Challenges ‐ Designing Local Ecohydrology and IWRM Educational Resources for Africa”. The project serves to supplement and further advance the outcomes of the original Upscaling Water Security to Meet Local, Regional, and Global Challenges project.
The overall purpose of the new project is to ensure that the Water Management Curricula produced under the original project are as relevant, applicable and appropriate to the African as well as the wider Asian context as possible, in turn enabling their widespread use and appreciation in relevant contexts.
When: 24-25 July 2019
Where: Jakarta, Indonesia
Background:
UNESCO’s International Hydrological Programme (IHP) Ecohydrology Demonstration Projects and Hydrology for Environment, Life and Policy (HELP) River Basin Network are two innovative approaches that involve engineering-based tools. These tools integrate both basin-wide human activities and changes in the hydrological cycle in order to sustain, improve and restore ecological functions and services in river basins, as a basis to support positive socioeconomic development.
Under the education component, the Water Management Curricula using Ecohydrology and IWRM serve as teaching materials suited for higher education, drawing upon experiences from Asia and the Pacific. The involvement by Humid Tropics Centre Kuala Lumpur (HTCKL) and a consortium of Malaysian universities in this exercise provided an opportunity to identify additional partners who could be involved in the implementation of the curricula in Malaysia.
Although the curricula have been designed to be applicable in Asia Pacific and Africa, they draw most of their practical examples, case studies and general frame of reference from the Malaysian context. In order to ensure that the curricula provide the greatest possible contribution towards sustainable development in Africa, there is a need to develop a localized version of the resources that draws on and refers to the African context.
Concept Note and Agenda
Concept Note
Contact Person:
Dr. Hans Dencker Thulstrup
Senior Program Specialist
Water and Environmental Sciences
h.thulstrup(at)unesco.org
