riverbp
USAID Central Asia’s Regional Water and Vulnerable Environment Activity continues its WEFE Nexus Lecture Series (No. 23) with a focus on financial and economic tools for supporting small basin councils (SBC).
Date: Thursday, April 9, 2024, at 4:00 pm (Almaty Time/GMT+5)
This lecture will be virtual with simultaneous English-to-Russian translation.
Register here: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJElcO6qqDgsEtTZ5MLgeNfuuPQ-xDkffSAv
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
Background:
There are more than 200 small transboundary rivers in Central Asia, each one facing unique challenges that hinder more efficient water use, such as deteriorating infrastructure, poor water accounting, and/or antiquated technology, among others. To address these issues, small basin councils provide input that considers the needs of many stakeholders, including farmers, energy producers, and civil society groups.
Today, basin councils are considered a crucial component of integrated water resources management. However, to exercise their authority and enable plan implementation, small basin councils require institutional and financial support. All countries allow external financial support (primarily through international development projects and private investors) for small basin councils, but more options are needed from the state and private sector.
Central Asian countries do offer small basin council financing options in the form of subsidies, loans and leases, typically reserved for the agricultural sector. But basin councils could avail themselves to that funding by proposing support for water-saving technologies, automatic water metering, improving technical equipment, etc.
WEFE Nexus lecture 23 will focus on the roles, tasks and limitations in the BCs and SBCs operation in CA, existing financial and economic instruments to support BCs and SBCs in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and obstacles and opportunities they have to attract financial resources for the implementation of their basin plans.
Lecturers:
We invite you to join us online for a fascinating talk with a Q&A session to follow.