MEP Water Group Public Session on the United Nations World Water Development Report 2018: Nature-Based Solutions for Water

On the 22th of May, the MEP Water Group in cooperation with the World Water Assessment Programme of UNESCO, hosted a successful public session for its 2018 United Nations World Water Development Report on 'Nature-based solutions for water' at the European Parliament.

Chaired by the MEP Paul Rübig, the session focused on informing policy and decision-makers, inside and outside the water community, about the great potential of nature-based solutions (NBS) in addressing contemporary water availability, quality and water management challenges across the sector.

A panel discussion brought together the perspectives from the water policy side, the industry, the utilities and the civil society that were presented by the following experts:

• Development perspective: Chantal Marijnissen, DG International Cooperation and Development (DEVCO)
• Environmental perspective: Victor Beumer, WssTP Cluster Leader on Hybrid Grey-Green Infrastructure.
• Utilities perspective: Patricia Ragazzo, VERITAS SPA
• Research and Innovation perspective: Julie Delcroix, Directorate-General for Research and Innovation, European Commission.

The session was supported by the EU Bulgarian Presidency with Atanaska Nikolova, Deputy Minister of Environment and Water from the Bulgarian Government being among the speakers of the session. The Deputy Minister pointed out that “the protection of water resources is very challenging but a key to sustainable development”.

Download all the presentations of the session.