UNU-IWEH Rolls out Monitoring System on Water-related SDGs
Water Supply including Sao Paulo ’ s drought and Kenya ’ s water supply challenges .
The conclusion ? That each challenge is different , but having a structured process can help policymakers identify and weigh trade-offs between different water uses and different water policy objectives .
This discussion continued at the workshop ’ s flagship event held at Oxford ’ s historic Martin School attended by over 150 participants . Richard Damania gave a presentation laying out the approach and preliminary results , followed by two panel discussions with leading water experts . Much of the discussion focused on two key issues , climate change and working in countries affected by fragility , conflict , and violence . Panelists and participants produced a number of suggestions for how the World Bank report could better influence the climate change discussion , including an invitation to engage with a major new research project being conducted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change , and recommendations on working with researchers to improve data availability and decision-making support , particularly in countries with low institutional capacity .
Despite plenty of debate and discussion during the two-day event , one common theme emerged among the researchers , practitioners , and experts assembled in Oxford : strengthened partnerships are essential to tackling the world ’ s water challenges . The World Bank team looks forward to sharing the results of the Unchartered Water report — and to hearing what you think !
Source : Inter Press Services
UNU-IWEH Rolls out Monitoring System on Water-related SDGs
3 February 2017 : The UN University Institute for Water , Environment and Health ( UNU-IWEH ) has launched a “ policy support system ” ( PSS ) for tracking progress and action towards achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 ( SDG 6 ) on clean water and sanitation . UNU is inviting policy makers , international organizations and water management professionals to assist in trialing and reviewing the monitoring system .
The Sustainable Development Goal Policy Support System ( SDG-PSS ) brings together tools from various international agencies to map progress against the SDG 6 targets and indicators in the areas of : finance ; capacity ; policy and institutional strength ; gender mainstreaming ; disaster risk reduction ( DRR ) and resilience mainstreaming ; and transparency . The PSS not only enables the mapping of progress , but also helps governments report on their SDG implementation efforts . It also seeks to support cross-sector , evidencebased policy and planning , and to accelerate progress on all water-related SDGs . The platform links data from more than 20 water-related tools developed by the World Health Organization ( WHO ), the UN Children ’ s Fund ( UNICEF ), the International Rescue Committee ( IRC ), and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development ( OECD ). Data used in the SDG-PSS comes from sources including the UN-Water Global Analysis and Assessment of Sanitation and Drinking Water ( GLAAS ), and the OECD ’ s Toolkit for Integrity .
The SDG-PSS is currently being tested in Costa Rica , Ghana , the Republic of Korea , Pakistan and Tunisia . Partners in this effort include the Korean Environment Corporation ( Keco ), the Ministry for Environment , the Republic of Korea , and the UN Office for Sustainable Development ( UNOSD ). UNU-IWEH has posted a series of video tutorials online to help interested stakeholders start using the SDG-PSS . The test version is available as an Excel file in English , Korean , French and Spanish .
In a communication to international organization partners , Vladimir Smakhtin , UNU-IWEH , noted that the current version of the SDG-PSS focuses on SDG 6 , but could eventually be adjusted to support mapping of achievements towards other SDGs .
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