International Water Week Amsterdam 2011

The first International Water Week, taking place in Amsterdam  during 29 October–4 November, will bring together businesses, non-profit organisations, government agencies and scientists to explore practical solutions to various global water issues. This six-day forum will include the Aquatech Amsterdam trade exhibition and the Aquaterra conference, as well as an extensive conference and workshop programme.

 The International Water Week in Amsterdam, the first event to deal with integrated solutions covering the entire water cycle, will be organised by the Royal Netherlands Water Network (KNW) and Waternet together with Amsterdam RAI, the International Water Association and the Netherlands Water Partnership. The contribution of KNW and Waternet will include five conferences regarding current issues in the field of water technology and water management.

 One of the conferences will focus on opportunities and risks relevant to water in an urban environment, notably the latest developments in terms of building on and close to water in cities, and how the urban environment will evolve in the future. Theconference programme will also examine opportunities provided by innovation in water technology, which is vital for many of the major challenges we face today, such asclimate change, ageing infrastructures, resource shortages and the like. Complementary subjects – including water as a source of renewable energy – will be highlighted in a separate conference, where comprehensive solutions and business concepts for cities, industrial zones and rural areas will be presented and discussed.

 The Netherlands has a long tradition of sharing expertise in water related solutions through cross-border peer-to-peer cooperation among water companies, also known as Water Operator Partnerships (WOPs). The effectiveness of these partnerships and the lessons learned from them will be examined during the International Water Week, which will also provide a unique opportunity to share knowledge on benchmarking in an international forum. Examples of benchmarking topics will include finding the best method to translate benchmark results to performance improvements, the effects of ranking, and cross-sector benchmarking.

 The preliminary announcements for these conferences were published in March. A call for papers has gone out, the deadline is 16^th June