A new report from the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) and the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS) underlines the vulnerability of agriculture to climate hazards in South Asia.
Sri Lanka faces another episode of flooding and landslides, as the southwest monsoons continue to trigger extreme weather in parts of the country. IWMI together with the Disaster Management Centre of Sri Lanka (DMC-SL) have activated their disaster charter with Sentinel Asia as of May 26. IWMI, having been appointed project manager of the charter, has been providing satellite-based high-resolution maps of the affected regions to the DMC and military to assist with rescue missions and further assessments.
WISE-UP - 'Water Infrastructure Solutions from Ecosystem Services Underpinning Climate Resilient Policies and Programmes' - aims to demonstrate natural infrastructure as a 'nature-based solution' for climate change adaptation and sustainable development in the Volta and Tana Basins. The WISE-UP project is implemented by IUCN with partners IWMI, BC3, ODI, ACCESS in Kenya, University of Manchester, and CSIR in Ghana, with the support of the Volta Basin Authority. It is funded by the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB).
From the IFPRI blog: on World Water Day, Janna de la Paz and Ruth Meinzen-Dick explore the difficulties of equitably and sustainably managing freshwater resources for farming, and look explain how experimental games can help farmers understand and sustain groundwater resources.
Hydropower has enormous importance in the world of clean energy, accounting for more than 85% of global renewable electricity generation in 2015. However, this sector often competes with irrigation, which has similar global importance; irrigated agriculture produces 40% of our food. A new paper, based on a WLE project with IFPRI and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), looks at this competition.
Urban and peri-urban wetlands of the city of Kolkata in India are under threat, and their ecosystem services are being lost due to rapid urbanization.
In the news
How farmers in Africa are finding ways to sustainably use wetlands
In recent decades, particularly in Africa, wetlands have become a new agricultural frontier. In response, a number of agencies are trying to explore sustainable wetland management as a way of reducing rural poverty, improving food security and strengthening livelihood resilience in the face of climate change.
Marloes Mul of the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) published a blog on the IUCN Water Knowledge Platform on the work being done under the WISE-UP to climate project. Specifically, the piece looks at natural infrastructure as an important element of balanced water resource management planning in the Volta Basin.
There is great potential to expand groundwater use for irrigation in sub-Saharan Africa for environmental sustainability, agricultural productivity and greater social equality.
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