Highlights
The seventh session of the Meeting of the Parties to the UNECE Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes took place on 17-19 November 2015 in Budapest, Hungary. The meeting was held back to back with the workshop on Promoting transboundary water cooperation in the Middle East and Northern Africa (MENA) region on the basis of the Water Convention.
At the session, the Meeting of the Parties reviewed progress achieved in the Convention’s implementation and past activities, discussed the future programme of work for 2016-2018 and addressed a wide variety of topics including: supporting accession to and implementation of the Convention; assessing the benefits of transboundary water cooperation; promoting climate change adaptation in a transboundary context; assessing the water-food-energy-ecosystems nexus in transboundary basins; improving water governance through the National Policy Dialogues under the European Union Water Initiative; and partnerships, in particular in the light of the globalization of the Water Convention and the entry into force of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Non-navigational Uses of International Watercourses in 2014.
The globalization of the Convention
Following the entry into force in 2013 of the amendment allowing accession by all United Nations Member States to the Convention, this session of the Meeting of the Parties marked the Convention’s transition into a global legal and intergovernmental framework for transboundary water cooperation. It was characterised by an unprecedented participation of countries from outside the UNECE region - 74 countries, Parties and non-Parties to the Convention, were represented in Budapest. Several of them expressed their intentions to accede.
The Meeting of the Parties adopted a decision on establishing a framework for the implementation of the Convention at the global level, complemented by a decision on cooperation with partners. As a result, in the coming three years, a strategy for the implementation of the Convention at the global level will be developed in close cooperation between Parties, non-Parties and partners. As United Nations Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson said in his video message: “With a global membership, the Water Convention can offer an essential intergovernmental platform and a home in the United Nations system for dealing with transboundary water issues”.
The contribution of the Convention to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and other global commitments
The Meeting of the Parties underlined that implementing the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs, the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction and the COP 21 Paris agreement will require enhanced cooperation across sectors and across borders. It therefore emphasized the important role of the Convention to support countries in their efforts to achieve the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the other global commitments. In this respect, the inclusion of a target on transboundary cooperation in the SDG on water and sanitation represents an important political recognition of the issue.
Main products
Two new publications were launched at the meeting. The Policy Guidance Note on Benefits of Transboundary Water CooperationDoc aims to help Governments and all relevant stakeholders develop a better understanding of the broad range of benefits of transboundary water cooperation. The report Reconciling Resource Uses in Transboundary Basins: Assessment of the Water-Food-Energy-Ecosystem Nexus showcases the way the innovative water- food-energy-ecosystems nexus approach can drive transboundary water cooperation and environmental protection by building synergies between the water, energy and food security sectors, ultimately improving water governance.
Other main decisions
The Meeting of the Parties adopted a decision on the establishment of a reporting mechanism under the Convention, starting with a pilot reporting exercise in 2016–2017 that should also be of use for countries contemplating accession to the Convention.
The regular reporting mechanism will allow tracking progress in the implementation of the provisions of the Convention as well as of the newly established Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) on Water and in particular the target on transboundary water cooperation.
An ambitious programme of work for 2016–2018 was also adopted in Budapest. Activities in the programme of work will support countries from all over the world to implement the Water Convention, to cooperate on the management of transboundary waters and to address global challenges, such as climate change, land degradation, water pollution, floods and droughts.