Expert Consultation Workshop: Finance & Water in North Africa & the wider Mediterranean, 24 February 2010, Madrid Spain

The Expert Consultation Workshop on Finance and Water in North Africa and the wider Mediterranean  was held on 24 February 2010 in Madrid, Spain.

It was organised by the MED EUWI Secretariat / GWP-Med and the EUWI-Finance Working Group with the support of Spain, Greece and the European Commission. The activity is also part of and contributes to the objectives of the GEF Strategic Partnership of the Mediterranean Large Marine Ecosystems.

The aim of the Workshop was to address and discuss the main challenges and opportunities the North African countries encounter with regard to financing the water sector and provide realistic recommendations based on experiences and lessons learnt from the North African countries and the wider Mediterranean region.

The Workshop will build on the Sharm El Sheikh Commitments for accelerating the achievement for water and sanitation goals in Africa, as decided in the African Union Assembly (30 June-1 July 2008), and contribute to the follow-up steps in that direction and specifically to the forthcoming African Ministerial Conference on Finance and Water (planned for 29-30 March 2010, Dakar, Senegal).

At the same time, the Workshop was expected to be complemented by and complemented the elaboration process of the Strategy on Water in the Mediterranean (SWM), within the framework of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), and specifically regarding the SWM’s chapter on Water Financing.

 In this respect, the Workshop was organised back-to-back with the 3rd Meeting of the Water Expert Group (WEG), 25 February, Madrid, that was mandated by the UfM Ministers on Water to elaborate on the SWM.