Preparations for first regional event on water accounting on the way

The first WES regional training on Water Accounting was originally scheduled to take place in June 2020 in Athens, Greece. Due to the current Covid-19 crisis, it was decided to review the organisation in order to hold instead an online training. This training is now scheduled to take place in September.  As it is likely that also in September regional events cannot take place, the project has already selected a tailored on-line platform which offers all the features needed for on-line training, allowing up to 40 participants in video mode to join from different remote locations (home/office). The sessions will have the possibility for participants to take the floor, share their screens and simultaneous interpretation will be running in parallel within the same platform. The platform can also host parallel breakout sessions. In view of the shift to on-line training,  the program is currently being slightly reshaped in sessions with an adapted content.

The purpose of this regional training event is to introduce water accounting as a tool to achieve integrated water governance and a sustainable water balance and to capture its important role in water monitoring. This activity is in line with the Water Financing Strategy of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), it will refer to International Standards – the UN System of Environmental Economic Accounting Central Framework (SEEA-CF), and the UN System of Environmental Economic Accounting for water (SEEA-water). It will also ensure complementarity with the ENI SEIS II South Support Mechanism which aims at improving the availability and access to relevant environmental information to the benefit of effective and knowledge-based policymaking in the Neighbourhood South region. 

This regional training event will be open for water experts within relevant ministries and the statistical offices of the WES Partner Countries.  Throughout the training event, participants will have the opportunity to get a comprehensive introduction to the overall concept of water accounts (environmental and economic components), to learn about the benefits of water accounting and the use of water accounting outputs (e.g. UN SDG process), to get introduced to the Physical Flow accounts and Physical Assets accounts, using the UN System of Environmental Economic Accounting for Water. There will also be room for discussing real situations in the countries of the participants, where water accounting can be implemented. LDK Consultants Global EEIG, will be responsible for the implementation of this activity.