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Water Nexus Belgium

L4WATER

Short Project description

Water Nexus was a policy support research project conducted between January 2019 and December 2020. The overall goal of the project was to support the Belgian Development cooperation in the design and implementation of an effective water strategy. It was conducted by a consortium of universities from Flanders and Wallonia, that is UClouvain, KULeuven, UGhent, UAntwerp, ULB, and ULiège. It was guided by a support committee which consisted of representatives of the Directorate-General for Development Cooperation (DGD), ARES, Enabel, and Join for Water.

Keywords, main expertise

Water cooperation Belgium. Policy support research. ONG. Private companies. Expert data base. Project data base

Funding bodies

ARES-Comission Coopération Développement

UCLouvain promotor(s)

Marnik Vanclooster

UCLouvain researcher(s)

Alice Alonso

External partners

  • KULeuven
  • UGent
  • UAntwerpen
  • ULB
  • ULiege

Deliverables

  • 1. Building Capacity for Contributing to SDG6 in Belgian Development Cooperation Programs: the Water Nexus Project. Conference Proceeding for the International Conference on Sustainable Development. Alonso, A., Vanclooster, M., Cools, J., Forio, M.A.E., Goethals, P., Ho, L.T., Huge, J., Marx, A., Verbist B. 2019. Access here

 

  • 2. Inventory of the Belgian Organisations in the Water Sector with International Development Cooperation Activities. Technical report. Alice Alonso, 2020. Access here

 

  • 3. Social network analysis of the Belgian water actors with international activities. Haj A. Ratsimbazafi, Jean Huge, Alice Alonso. 2021. Access here

 

  • 4. Water research in support of the Sustainable Development Goal 6: a case study in Belgium. J. Clean. Prod. 277, 124082 (2020). Ho, L., Alonso, A., Eurie Forio, M. A., Vanclooster, M. & Goethals, P. L. M. Access here

 

  • 5. Analysis of Belgian ODA to the water sector:
    • a. Data visualization: interactive graphs and Static graphs. Alice Alonso, 2020. Access here
    • b. Report. Courtesy of Isabelle Wittoeck, 2020. Access here

 

 

  • 7. Challenges, barriers, and opportunities to reach SDG6 in the partner countries of the Belgian development cooperation
    • a. Overview based on the survey of the actors. Technical report. Alice Alonso and Jan Cools, 2020. Access here
    • b. Overview based on the survey of the embassies. Technical report. Jan Cools and Alice Alonso, 2020. Access here

 

  • 8. SWOT analysis of the water sector in the Belgian development cooperation programs.
    • a. From a workshop with DGD implementation partners; Access here
    • b. From the Water Without Borders event gathering water actors from all sectors. Access here

 

  • 9. Minutes of the meetings with representatives of Belgian organizations in the water sector with international cooperation activities – Alice Alonso and Bruno Verbist, 2020. Access here

 

  • 10. Réflexion pour une stratégie de l’eau pour la coopération belge : Consultation des acteurs au Burundi. Report. Alice Alonso, 2020. Access here

 

  • 11. Report on the thematic webinars on Water-Energy and Food Nexus, WASH, and the private sector engagement. Joost Wellens, Alice Alonso, and Marnik Vanclooster, 2020. Access here

 

  • 12. Policy Brief: PPPs in (waste)water and sanitation (still under review). Maira Finizola e Silva, Jan Cools, Axel Marx, Bruno Verbist, Alice Alonso, 2020. Access here

 

  • 13. Towards a water strategy for Belgium Development Cooperation: Comparative analysis of the strategies of organizations relevant to Belgium, and lessons learned from neighbor countries. Report. Alice Alonso, Jan Cools, Jean Hugé, Bruno Verbist, 2020. Access here

 

  • 14. Brainstorming for the Belgian development cooperation with the key implementation partners – Introductory presentation. Alice Alonso and Bruno Verbist, 2020. Access here

 

  • 15. Water strategy of the Belgian Development Cooperation o Draft 11/2020. Access here

 

General Conclusions and perspectives

The Policy Support Research project “Water Nexus” started in January 2019 and ended in December 2020. The project has resulted in a depiction of the rich water landscape in Belgium in terms of the stakeholders, the water projects and programs funded by the Belgian official development assistance (ODA) over the course of the past 10 years, and the body of scientific water research. It has also gathered the Belgian actors through the organization of thematic webinars and by actively participating in the organization of the Water Without Borders event in Brussels in 2019. These events facilitated the interaction between the Belgian actors and stimulated discussion for the identification of synergistic pathways and bottlenecks for a coherent and efficient Belgian water program. The Water Nexus project has also started a reflection on the inclusion of the private sector in the framework of the development cooperation programs, curated and documented tools for impact and risk management, and compiled a list of relevant data and water information. The project's outcomes are described in reports and scientific publications, and hosted on the Water Nexus website. The website also includes a series of dashboards to search and interact with the databases of actors, projects, and scientific research. Finally, the Water Nexus project has worked with DGD to produce a blueprint of a water strategy for the Belgian development cooperation, through a consultation approach with the actors in Belgium and Burundi. The draft strategy has been circulated to the Belgian embassies in the partner countries, and the organizations that are members of the water platform. At this date (07 January 2020), the feedbacks are being taken into account by the scientists in the Water Nexus consortium. The responses to each comment will be submitted to DGD, together with the revised strategy. DGD will then pursue the effort to officialize the document.

Water Nexus has shed a light on the variety of actors and expertise hosted in Belgium. Together with the recent Water Platform initiative, we believe that the Water Nexus has played an important role in starting a momentum in building a Belgian water identity and a more coherent, joint impactful presence internationally. However, it has also highlighted a somewhat fragmentation in the way the actors work or do not work together. Work remains to be done for the effort conducted by the Water Nexus project to reach concrete and lasting results and to explore further opportunities. Among others, the Water Nexus has identified a few lines of work :

  • The expansion of the DGD water strategy to a strategy for the entire country. There is also a need for the water strategy to be part of a bigger plan that sets the framework for true intersectoral work and approaches, taking into account the many interlinks and rippling positive and negative effects that actions in one sector can have on another.
  • Further studies would remain useful on topics related to the integration of international initiatives, among which the European Green new deal and the Team Europe, and the existing mechanisms, opportunities, and possible danger of engaging the private sector both from Belgium and from the partner countries.
  • It is important to also mention that repertory of water actors and the country fact sheets will soon be outdated. A permanent water secretariat that could execute regular updates and other tasks would be a tremendous asset to keep building on the Water Nexus initiative. Such a unit could also be formal support to the Water Platform that has thus far functioned voluntarily. As reported by Antoon Van Broeckhoven, the existence, with the new government, of additional funding for DGD could be an option to finance such a water hub and perhaps fund a water PSR in the longer run. A discussion with the DGD change manager (Geert VantSinjean) could be necessary to investigate the options available.
  • The extension of the database of projects by adding detailed information of project led by universities (so far, VLIR-UOS report aggregate projects, no information on the project scale is available, while ARES has started internal reporting on the project scale in 2020, but it is not clear how they report to DGD) and other Belgian actors (e.g. those by Enabel and Join for Water with funds other than from DGD). The team of UGent has initiated a reflection on that matter.
  • On a side note, there was the mention of an EU platform on which all development agencies can propose a list of actors to work with to all the member states. It might be interesting to further investigate how can Belgium be part of that initiative.