2-The European Commission has adopted on April 21 an ambitious and comprehensive package of measures to help improve the flow of money towards sustainable activities across the European Union. By enabling investors to re-orient investments towards more sustainable technologies and businesses, the measures will be instrumental in making Europe climate neutral by 2050. They will make the EU a global leader in setting standards for sustainable finance. The package is comprised 3 main components. The 1st one is the EU Taxonomy Climate Delegated Act aims to support sustainable investment by making it clearer which economic activities most contribute to meeting the EU’s environmental objectives. The College of Commissioners reached a political agreement on the text. The Delegated Act will be formally adopted at the end of May once translations are available in all EU languages. Communication, also adopted by the College sets out the Commission’s approach in more detail. The 2nd proposal for a Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD). This proposal aims to improve the flow of sustainability information in the corporate world. It will make sustainability reporting by companies more consistent, so that financial firms, investors, and the broader public can use comparable and reliable sustainability information. Finally, six amending Delegated Acts on fiduciary duties, investment, and insurance advice will ensure that financial firms, e.g. advisers, asset managers, or insurers, include sustainability in their procedures and their investment advice to clients. The European Green Deal is Europe’s growth strategy that aims to improve the well-being and health of citizens, make Europe climate-neutral by 2050 and protect, conserve and enhance the EU’s natural capital and biodiversity. Further information on EMWIS website

3- The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) is hosting the webinar “Joining efforts to turn satellite water data into actionable information for farmers”. Achieving food security in the future while using water resources in a sustainable manner is a major challenge for us and the next generations. Agriculture is a key water user. A careful monitoring of water productivity in agriculture and exploring opportunities to increase it are required. The FAO portal to monitor Water Productivity through Open access of Remotely sensed derived data (WaPOR) monitors and reports on agriculture water productivity over Africa and the Near East. It provides open access to the water productivity database and its thousands of underlying map layers, it allows for direct data queries, time series analyses, area statistics and data download of key variables associated to water and land productivity assessments.  The webinar will reflect on the results of the first phase and present the objectives and focuses proposed for the 2nd phase of the WaPOR project. The webinar was planned initially for April 22 but it has to be postponed new date will be defined soon. Further information on EMWIS website

4- The EC has published a new guidance under the COM 2018 Action Plan on Environmental Compliance Assurance, namely the Vade Mecum on environmental compliance assurance in rural areas. The purpose of the Vade Mecum is to set out good practises on how national authorities should interact with farmers and land managers in order to ensure compliance with EU environment legislation, particularly on water and nature. It explains approaches to preventing, detecting and responding to compliance failures, and shows how agricultural practices can be reconciled with environmental obligations. This Vade Mecum can highly contribute to delivering European Green Deal objectives, particularly the Biodiversity strategy, as it focuses on the mechanisms for overseeing delivery on the ground in Member States. The Vade Mecum supports the role of public authorities in ensuring that farmers and other rural land-managers comply with their environmental obligations. This role involves public authorities taking combinations of three different kinds of action. Further information on EMWIS website

5-  Aiming to follow up on the conclusions of the 10th WEG Meeting (Brussels, 13-14 June 2019), the 11th WEG meeting was held on 28 April 2021, with a reduced composition, involving only the Member States and had the two-fold objective to: Take stock of the Progress made so far on the implementation of the UfM Water Policy Framework of Actions and its Financial Strategy for Water as well as promote the alignment of the UfM Water Agenda with the New Agenda for the Mediterranean and the European Green Deal, including the recovery trajectory. Among others, the meeting aimed to contribute to the Mediterranean regional preparatory process towards the 9th World Water Forum (Dakar, Senegal, March 2022) that concerns also the organisation of the 4th Mediterranean Water Forum (Malta, 1st week of December 2021). Further information on EMWIS website

6- The Commission has launched an online public consultation to seek views on the update of the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive (UWWTD). Untreated wastewater can put human health and the environment at risk and pollute lakes, rivers, soil and coastal and groundwater. Under the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive, EU countries are required to ensure that urban wastewater is collected and treated appropriately. This revision aims to address the shortcomings identified in the recent 2019 evaluation report; to contribute to the aims of the European Green Deal Search for available translations of the preceding, including the ambitions set out in the Circular Economy Action Plan; and to the upcoming Zero Pollution Action Plan. In this public consultation, stakeholders and civil society are invited to share their views on the various policy measures developed by the Commission over the past year, based on feedback and cooperation with Member States and stakeholders. Sanitation synthesis by countries and details on individual wastewater treatment plans can be consulted at https://uwwtd.eu Further information on EMWIS website

7- The UfM Regional Platform in Research and Innovation (R&I) invited the opinion, ideas and input of relevant individuals and organisations from across the region to help outline the future of R&I cooperation between the EU and the Mediterranean. An online consultation call has been put out for higher education and research institutions, civil society, private sector entities and governmental organisations at national, regional and local level, the consultation was opened from 17 March to 7 May. The survey will help UfM Member States to identify the right topics to focus on in each priority area, how to achieve Sustainable Development Goals, and what barriers to effective cooperation might be encountered. The UfM has defined three priority areas for research and innovation cooperation: health, renewable energy, and climate change. Consultation answers will be taken into account and further refined by the UfM Expert Group into three Roadmaps, corresponding to the three priority areas of health, renewable energy and climate change. These Road-maps will set out interventions for increasing collaboration capacity in the coming years, and will be discussed at the UfM R&I Platform in June. Further information on EMWIS website

8- The Arab Maghreb Union (UMA), in collaboration with the FAO office for North Africa, organized a high-level Maghreb political dialogue on 22 March in Tunis which presented the visions, strategic orientations and approaches adopted for the use of the potential of so-called unconventional water resources. Mr. Tariq Addassalam, Minister of Water Resources of Libya, presented the water situation in Libya and mentioned some challenges related to water and climate change which are similar to those of the other Maghreb countries. Senior officials from other countries presented the position of their respective ministers.   Mr Taïeb Baccouche, Secretary General of the UMA, welcomed the work of this dialogue, which made it possible to highlight common challenges linked to water scarcity and the potential of unconventional water in the Maghreb countries as well as offering the opportunity to "learn more about the successful experiences and the review of the strategic orientations presented to assess the potential of unconventional water for agriculture.” He expressed confidence in the prospect of strengthening cooperation between countries for "the identification of orientations and strategic plans for unconventional waters." In his speech, Mr. Philippe Ankers, FAO Coordinator for North Africa, recalled “the considerable attention FAO gives to water scarcity which has taken a wide range of initiatives and activities to strengthen the capacity to adopt mechanisms to address water scarcity. Among them, the Regional Initiative on Water Scarcity, launched in 2013." The Maghreb Dialogue today was a result of the project "Unblocking the Potential of Treated Wastewater and Drainage Water for Agricultural Development in the Arab Maghreb Countries". Further information on EMWIS website

9- On 8 April, AVITEM organised its first webinar in a series of three, designed to address the scarcity of emblematic Mediterranean resources, but also the solutions, both traditional and innovative, that apply to the research, conservation and optimised management of these resources. This first webinar is part of a global "NEXUS" Water-Energy-Waste approach. The aim is to give the floor to experts, practitioners, innovators from the south and north of the Mediterranean who are willing to exchange their understanding, practices and perspectives on water management and consumption for the first event, and who are ready to reflect together on the path towards self-sufficiency. During this first webinar, Ms Stéphanie Laronde, Director of Institutional and Technical Support and Cooperation - International Office for Water, gave an overview of the situation as well as institutional twining projects, climate change adaptation projects incubators, circular cities approach (presentation can found here). Further information on EMWIS website

10- Almost 750 organizations participated in the Consultation Process of the 9th World Water Forum, which took place from 15 January to 26 March 2021.  The consultation process was created to ensure a multi-stakeholder approach to mobilize action on water through an integrated approach based on multi-stakeholder exchanges and to meet the Forum's goal of inclusiveness. During the consultation period, members of each Consultation Group submitted their contributions to the content development, by answering an online questionnaire through the World Water Forum Collaborative Platform. In particular, Consultation Groups were invited to provide their feedback on the actions plans developed by the action Groups in the past months. Additionally, they could also request to contribute to a project or propose to include a new project. During next weeks, Action Groups will process the nearly 200 proposals received during the consultative phase and select the most in line with their objectives. At the moment, the number of organizations involved in the content development of the 9th World Water Forum is more than 1000. Further information on EMWIS website

11- The EU-Gulf Countries Clean Energy Technology Network (EU GCC CETN) and the Environmental Center for Arab Towns (ECAT) organized on 5 April a virtual conference on "Innovative cities in the context of climate change: Risk management in water and energy supply. The conference covered 3 main topics: 1-Building climate resilience in cities: Cities led actions 2- How can clean energies influence resilience in cities?3- Resilience and sustainable water supply in cities. During this last session, Eric Mino presented EMWIS contributions based on experiences from the COST Action Circular Cities, EdiCiNet and HYDROUSA H2020 projects. Further information on EMWIS website

12- As part of strengthening Morocco and the European Union cooperation and taking into account the "Joint Declaration of the European Union and Morocco" of June 2019, reporting on the establishment of a "Shared Knowledge Space", Morocco has begun its process of association with the European Programme "Horizon Europe", with a global budget of 95.5 billion euros, under the new European programming 2021-2027. The status of "Associated Country" of the Programme will not only improve the attractiveness and visibility of Moroccan research structures vis-à-vis their European counterparts, but will also encourage and facilitate their rapprochement with EU Member States, companies, NGOs and social partners with a view to exploiting research and technology transfer. In addition, Moroccan researchers will be able to access the calls for projects of the Horizon Europe programme, open to researchers from EU Member States and other countries associated to the Framework Programme, as partners or coordinators of submitted projects. Further information on EMWIS website 

13- The first newsletter of SAFERS Project and the first animated video are available on the project website. SAFERS project aims to support societies becoming more resilient across the key phases of the forests fires emergency management cycle. Officially started in October 2020 for a period of 3 years, SAFERS is going to create an open and integrated platform featuring a forest fire Decision Support System, including monitoring of forest ecosystems recovery after a fire event. To know more about the project you can watch the animated video available in 6 languages (subtitles): French, Finnish, German, Greek, Italian and Spanish on SAFERS YouTube Channel and  read the Newsletter which recaps the developments of SAFERS activities since its beginning. Further information about the project on SAFERS Website

14- The new EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change “Forging a climate-resilient Europe” sets the scene for more ambitious action on climate adaptation. The objective of the strategy is to progress swiftly toward the 2050 resilience vision by making adaptation action smarter, more systemic, and faster. It is a cornerstone of the European Green Deal and complements the proposed Climate Law and the Climate Pact, but also other initiatives. HYDROUSA was selected as an Horizon 2020 project contributing to the new EU Climate Adaptation Strategy. HYDROUSA developed a new circular business model based on water valuing, mostly suitable for Mediterranean and other water-scarce regions in Europe and worldwide. Further information can be found here

15- SUPROMED “Sustainable Production in water limited environments of Mediterranean agro-ecosystem” is an R&I project co-funded under the PRIMA 2018 programme section I, for a period of 3 years starting from October 2019. SUPROMED will provide a holistic crop-livestock water management system resilient to climate change. In detail, an end-user IT (Information Technology) platform specially designed to smartly advise farmers in the efficient water management of Mediterranean cropping and livestock systems will be delivered. To this aim, SUPROMED will integrate a validated set of models and tools (MOPECO7, IREY8, DOPIR9 or DOPIR-SOLAR10) in an online platform to increase the production and income of farms through a reduction and a more efficient use of water, and other inputs such as energy and fertilizers, while decreasing the impact on the environment. To learn more about SUPROMED project you can watch the project video here

16-  Sustain-COAST project was presented on 26 April at the EGU general assembly. The annual EGU General Assembly is Europe’s largest and most prominent geosciences event. The project coordinator (Technical University of Crete) presented the approach adopted by Sustain-COAST project: Living Labs towards sustainable groundwater management  giving the example of  Malia, Crete, Greece case study. Sustain-COAST “Sustainable coastal groundwater management and pollution reduction through innovative governance in a changing climate” is an R&I project co-funded under the PRIMA 2018 programme section II, for a period of 3 years starting from June 2019.  Further information on Sustain-COAST website

17- A technical support service was launched to provide free advice and guidance to all organic operators from the project partner countries (Jordan, Lebanon, Italy, Tunisia, Greece, Spain) as part of the ORGANIC ECOSYSTEM project Boosting cross-border Organic Ecosystem through enhancing agro-food alliances (funded by the ENI CBC MED Programme 2014-2020), seeks to create a cross-border agro-food system to develop organic agriculture in the Mediterranean area. Starting from 4 May 2021 a team of advisers will answer any questions on marketing, legislation, agri-food chains, olive growing, viticulture and vegetable crops, pests and pathogens here.

18- The webinar series “Innovation for SDGs: inspirational tools towards sustainability challenges” focuses on opportunities and new trends in the fields of research and innovation. The goal was to debate and advance towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The session was moderated by  the Catalan Institute for Water Research (ICRA) leader of the toolbox development within the EdiCitNet project. The EdiCitNet toolbox was presented, as an interactive space for knowledge sharing. Special attention was given to the diverse functionalities provided such as: An interactive Catalogue in which any person can create profiles for their (edible)NBS. Such profiles showcase technical information and offers a set of interactive functions that make it a true social network for users (civil society, urban planners, researchers). A Design and planning tool which enables users to create their own initiative(s) by giving insights about resources needed and food potential. A Performance assessment tool which enables user to compare the performance of these initiatives in terms of sustainability, urban challenges, and ecosystem services. You can watch the recording of the webinar here

19- The managing director of the Sanitation and Wastewater Establishment of the Region of Murcia (Esamur) visited the works of the new Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) in the village of Majada, in the Mazarrón municipality  to view the progress of the new installation. This new infrastructure will contribute to promoting eco-sustainability of the municipality and supporting efforts being made by the regional government to promote the re-use of water, as after purifying the wastewater produced in the town, the cleaned water will be made available to local farmers for crop irrigation. The project is expected to be completed by July, as work is progressing at a good pace. Further information on EMWIS website

20- After two years of successive drought, Morocco’s dam filling is almost stable at 51.3% by March 8, said the water department. In a recent report, the ministry noted that last year water storage in Moroccan dams stood at an average of 49%. While north and central dams show resilience and higher filling capacity, those of the key agricultural region of Souss are at critical levels leaving the risk of water cuts during next summer. Experts expect water storage in Morocco’s dams to further decrease due to evaporation and high demand this summer. Morocco has 145 large dams and 250 small ones and expects 20 more dams between 2020 and 2027. Further information on EMWIS website

21- A Green talk was held on 14 April in Tunis on the theme “Sustainable and inclusive water management in Tunisia: what role for public and private actors?”. This event is part of the “30 Days of Dialogue on Green Transition in Europe and Africa”, jointly organised by the Portuguese Presidency of the European Union and the European Investment Bank on the sidelines of the Africa-EU High Level Forum on Green Investment to be held in Lisbon on 23 April. The conference brought together national and international private and public sector actors and was an opportunity to exchange best practices and feedback on the inclusive and sustainable management of water resources. Mr. Jean-Luc Revéreault, Head of the EIB Representation in Tunisia, recalled the long-standing strategic partnership between Tunisia and the EIB. Mr. Atef Majdoub, President of the General Forum of Public-Private Partnerships, insisted, for his part, on the important role that public-private partnerships can play in the development of infrastructure necessary for the supply and treatment of water. Further information on EMWIS website

22- The French Development Agency (AFD) joins forces with the Investment and Development Fund of Montenegro (IDF) to facilitate investments in support of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). A €50 million credit line and a €400,000 technical assistance grant, in support of developing climate projects in line with the Paris Agreement, were signed on April 21 in Paris. Further information on EMWIS website

23-To increase investment in seawater desalination and wastewater reuse tenfold, Egypt is relying on public private partnerships (PPPs). The government of this North African country has thus launched a call for financing for local and foreign companies through the Sovereign Wealth Fund of Egypt (TSFE). “A partnership with these different parties will maximise the return on investment in the water sector in Egypt,” says Hala El-Said, the Egyptian Minister of Planning and Economic Development. Companies interested in the call for financing have until September 2021 to submit their bids to the Egyptian Sovereign Wealth Fund, a financing mechanism managed by the Egyptian Ministry of Planning and Economic Development. Further information on EMWIS website

24- Prime Minister Dr. Mohammad Ishtayyeh, the Consul General of France, the EU Representative, and the AFD Country Director together with the Head of the Palestinian Water Authority, Hebron Governor and representatives of the local community laid the corner stone for the Hebron Regional Waste Water Treatment Plant in Hebron. At completion, the plant will serve around 400,000 people living in Hebron City and along Wadi As-Samen in Hebron Governorate and will pave the way to treated water reuse for agricultural purpose. Sewage from the Hebron Governorate runs untreated through populated areas (Wadi As-Samen) causing a substantial damage to the aquifer and the health of the residents. Safeguarding water and the environment is key towards sustainable development and ensuring a better future for all Palestinians. The Hebron Regional Wastewater Management Project is developing a treatment plant and will support the Hebron Municipality in the establishment of an independent water and wastewater service. The project addresses the immediate needs for treatment of the existing sewage stream coming from 80% of Hebron city. The Wastewater Treatment Plant will treat the sewage flow in Wadi As-Samen. The project will reduce environmental pollution and health risks from wastewater produced in the Hebron Municipality.Further information on EMWIS website