A training workshop in integrated management of natural resources with a focus on water and coastal resources was organized by SWIM-SM jointly with H2020 CB/MEP.
24 participants from Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco and Tunisia attended the workshop. They represented ministries dealing with water, environment, agriculture, interior issues, land use planning, integrated coastal zone management, etc. Research centers, basin agencies, and the Algerian National Federation for the Protection of the Environment (an NGO) were also amongst the trainees.
The training focused on the concepts, planning principles and tools of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) and Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) and how these two concepts are interlinked.
As integration in both ICZM and IWRM is taking place across similar systems (same geographical areas, governance issues, sectors, stakeholders, etc.) emphasis was given on how to enhance the operational linkages between these two management modalities and how to overcome more effectively the ‘silo’ effect, by promoting a multi-disciplinary, multi-sectoral, multi-level and inter-generational approach.
Academic and practical knowledge were conveyed to participants and successful integrated planning cases from Lake Bizerte in Tunisia, the Buna/Bojana river in Montenegro and Albania and Rhodes Island in Greece, served to demonstrate that integrated management of resources involving the key stakeholders from the design phase to the decision making process is feasible and ensures the maximum success possible. The Algerian experience in ICZM and IWRM was also presented.
Participants were also engaged in an exercise session consisting of work on three main topics related to integrated management, namely: 1.Building the vision; 2.Governance; and 3.Tools and methodologies and in a field visit to a water distribution pump station in the commune of Mahlema and a wastewater treatment station in Beni Messous in order to expose participants to the actual tools that can be used in IWRM and ICZM.
The managers and staff of both stations presented their facilities in the context of water allocation for different uses, sourcing and protection of the coast from pollution and reduction of fresh water consumption with the treatment and reuse of wastewater in agriculture and landscape irrigation, firefighting in forests, street washing and leisure.