Urbanisation and Water Management: Turning Adversity into Opportunity

8:00 a.m. (BST) / 3:00 a.m. (EDT) 9th September 2010

This seminar will be streamed live from World Water Week in Stockholm.

Among the greatest challenges facing governments and local authorities today is rapid urbanisation and increasing poverty. It is estimated that more than half of the world's population now lives in urban areas. By 2030 that figure is projected to rise to two-thirds. UN-HABITAT statistics show that the cities growing fastest are those of the developing world and the fastest growing neighborhoods are the slums. Today, one billion urban residents in the world live in slum conditions: characteriszed by lack of basic services, substandard housing, overcrowding, hazardous locations, lack of employment, insecurity of tenure and social exclusion.

The rapid growth of cities and towns has put enormous pressure on the provision of urban water and sanitation services. Weak institutional capacity to keep up with the growing demand for services, poor national budget allocation for water and sanitation, declining Overseas Development Assistance and lack of reliable and up-to-date sector information are some of the key challenges facing governments in their pursuit of the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) targets for water and sanitation. The situation is worsened by water quality degradation and increasing vulnerability to climate change.

The seminar will identify and discuss critical issues and lay out key strategies for urban water management. Discussions will focus on urban trends and their implications for urban water policy and practice.

Programme

Chair: Mr. Bert Diphoorn, Director, Human Settlements Financing Division, UN-HABITAT

09:00 - Welcome and introduction. Mr. Bert Diphoorn, Director, Human Settlements Financing Division, UN-HABITAT, Nairobi, Kenya

09:05 - Keynote Address on "Paths to sustainable urban water management: UN-HABITAT perspectives". Dr. Graham Alabaster, Chief, Section I, Water, Sanitation and Infrastructure Branch, UN-HABITAT, Nairobi, Kenya

09:20 - The "Istanbul Water Consensus". Mr. Ger Bergkamp, Director General, World Water Council, Marseilles, France

09:35 - Managing water for cities: A call to action. Dr. Margaret Catley-Carlson, Patron, Global Water Partnership and Member of UNSGAB

09:50 - Integrated water resources management - needs and challenges. Prof. Judith Rees, Member, UNSGAB and Director of the Grantham Research Institute and also Director of the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy, London, UK

10:05 - The SWITCH approach to integration for more sustainable urban water management.Ms. Barbara Anton, Project Coordinator Water, European Secretariat, ICLEI - Local Governments for Sustainability, Freiburg, Germany

10:20 - Questions and Answers

The Portable Microbiology Laboratory: A breakthrough in water testing for small towns in developing countries. Prof. Robert Metcalf, California State University, Sacramento

10:30 - Coffee Break

11:00 - Panel Debate: Key issues and strategies for urban water management

Panellists:

• Mr. Paul Reiter, Executive Director, International Water Association, London, United Kingdom (tbc)
• Dr. Shehu Yahaya, Executive Director, African Development Bank, Tunis (tbc)
• Mr. Federico Basanes, Head of the Water and Sanitation Division, Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, DC, USA (tbc)
• Mr. Piers Cross, Sanitation and Water for All secretariat, New York, USA

11:45 - Plenary discussion on key issues arising from the debate

12:20 - Wrap-Up and Summary of Main Issues. Mr. Bert Diphoorn, UN-HABITAT

12:30 - Close of Seminar

Bert Diphoorn & Graham Alabaster - UN-HABITAT, Ger Bergkamp - World Water Council, Margaret Catley-Carlson - Global Water Partnership , Judith Rees - UNSGAB, Shehu Yahaya - African Development Bank, Federico Basanes - Inter-American Development Bank and others View Recording