On 18 March 2009 Dr Reza Ardakanian, Director of UNW-DPC, and Richard Taylor, Executive Director of IHA, signed a Memorandum of Understanding. The Memorandum marks the beginning of a close cooperation between the two organizations including the organization of joint training workshops, with the support of other UN-Water members.

Up to 35 experts from transboundary water basin organisations and riparian governments sharing lakes, aquifers and rivers in South-East Asia, the Americas, Africa and Europe, and from international organisations working on transboundary water cooperation will meet in Bonn from 10-12 November 2008 to exchange ideas and experiences concerning the development of institutional capacities to manage shared waters and increase sustainable transboundary cooperation.

Please download the press release in English or German.

This press kit supplies additional information regarding the workshop "Institutional Capacity Development in Transboundary Basins" taking place at the BMZ, Germany from 10-12 November 2008. In the offered electronic press kit you can find the poster of the workshop; the flyer of the workshop, the new issue of the UNW-DPC newsletter and the flyer about UNW-DPC.

UN-Water Decade Programme on Capacity Development (UNW-DPC) and United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT) organized from 3 to 5 September 2008 the International Workshop on “Drinking Water Loss Reduction: Developing Capacity for Applying Solutions”, held at the UN Campus in Bonn, Germany. More than 60 participants, including water managers and water decision-makers from 18 cities around the world confronted with the problem of drinking water losses, met in Bonn to share their experiences regarding technical, political and administrative solutions and capacity development tools.

For more information please download the post workshop press release.

The reduction of the loss of drinking water is the overall topic of the UNW-DPC workshop taking place from 3-5 September. Reducing the loss of drinking water could provide nearly 90 million people with fresh water without increasing the demand on water resources. High level experts and decision makers from all over the world will discuss possible solutions at the UN Campus in Bonn.

For more information please download the press release here.

You can find here additional information regarding the workshop "Drinking Water Loss Reduction" taking place at the UN Campus from 3-5 September 2008. In the offered electronic press kit you can find the poster of the workshop; the flyer of the workshop, the new issue of the UNW-DPC newsletter and the flyer about UNW-DPC.

On 7 May 2008 Dr Reza Ardakanian, Director of UNW-DPC, Peter Cook, President of EWA and Johannes Lohaus, Secretary General of EWA, signed a Memorandum of Understanding. The Memorandum is the beginning of a close cooperation between the two organisations. The intention is to organise summer schools, conferences on capacity development and to complement each other’s goals.

On 22 November 2007 the Founding Director of UNW-DPC, Dr. Reza Ardakanian, and the President of DWA, Prof. Otto Schaaf, signed a Memorandum of Understanding. The Memorandum is the beginning of a close cooperation between the two organisations. The intention is to organise summer schools, conferences on capacity development and to complement each other’s goals.

On 31 August 2007 the UN-Water Decade Programme on Capacity Development (UNW-DPC) celebrated its official opening in the presence of the two German Federal Ministries funding the work of the office. The Ministries represented by the State Secretaries Professor Frieder Meyer-Krahmer for the Ministry of Education and Research, and Erich Stather for the Ministry of Economic Co-operation and Development, as well as the acting Vice-Rector of the United Nations University in Europe, Professor Janos J. Bogardi, introduced the new Director of UNW-DPC, Dr. Reza Ardakanian. Also present were Dr. Pasquale Steduto (FAO), Chairman of the UN-Water coordination platform, and the Lady Mayor of the City of Bonn, Bärbel Dieckmann.

More than one hundred guests, including heads of the Bonn-based UN organisations, German government officials, representatives from the City of Bonn, the University of Bonn, NGOs and many other well-wishers, gathered to welcome the new programme office to Germany and assure the Director of their support.

Dr. Reza Ardakanian, holder of an MSc and PhD in Water Resources Management from McMaster University in Canada, is a Faculty member of Sharif University of Technology in Tehran, Iran. From 2001-2005 he served as Deputy Minister for Water Affairs in the Iranian Ministry of Energy. From 2003 until 2007 he was a member of the Governing Board of UNESCO-IHE, based in Delft in the Netherlands, and also serves the International Water Academy in Oslo, Norway, as a member of the Board of Trustees. He is the Founding Director of RCUWM, a regional centre for urban water management in Tehran, under the auspices of UNESCO.