The Forest Water Champions
In August 2017, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and the Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI) established an expert group from the forestry and water sectors to identify common ground, and to enhance the attention to the important role played by the forest-water nexus in securing resilient landscapes. The expert group, the Forest-Water Champions (FWC), brings together the following partners: AGWA, CIFOR/ICRAF, CGIAR, FAO, Global Resilience Partnership, IUCN, IUFRO, SIWI Swedish Water House, UNEP, and WRI.
Discussions during the first network meeting resulted in the formulation of a common statement: "Forests and water; managing our connected natural capital", which provides a common ground for the network to engage in international processes, highlighting the importance of the forest-water nexus for sustainable development, landscape restoration and climate change mitigation/adaptation. The FWC meets regularly to build on its convergence of perspectives and ideas and to implement them through engagement in international processes.
The contributions made by the expert group includes contributions to the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030 and the Talanoa Dialogue. The FWC also participate in major international events such as World Water Week, the World Forestry Congress and COPs of the different Multilateral Environmental Agreements through the organization of side events, sessions, webinars as well as the development of policy briefs, blogs and notes to advocate for the inclusion of the forest-water nexus in international policy.
Below you will find information on upcoming or recent events.
UNFCCC COP28 Resilience Hub Event: Landscapes for water – Scaling up locally-led climate action
8 December 2023
The Alliance for Global Water Adaptation, Australian Water Partnership, Stockholm International Water Institute and Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations are co-hosting a session at the Resilience Hub under the theme 'Water and Natural Ecosystems' for this years UNFCCC COP28.
This session will be held on Friday the 8th of December from 13:30-14:30 GST (10:30-11:30 CET).
Local communities are on the frontlines of climate change impacts and have a leading role in managing natural resources. When landscapes are managed sustainably through holistic and inclusive approaches, they can provide a wealth of ecosystem services that are vital for climate change adaptation and mitigation. These services include water regulation and provision, habitat provision for biodiversity and maintenance of carbon stocks.
This session will focus on best-practices, tools, and local initiatives that strengthen climate action and water resilience across landscapes, followed by a discussion on how they can be upscaled and systematically incorporated into global and national processes.
Click here to view the agenda and here to register your virtual attendance. We look forward to seeing you there!
XV World Forestry Congress session: Forest - water connections to achieve the SDGs
3 May 2022
CIFOR/ICRAF, UNEP and SIWI Swedish Water House are organizing a session under Sub-theme 6 - Forests without boundaries - titled “Forest-Water Connections to achieve the SDGs”
The session will take place on Tuesday 3 May 2022 from 11:00 to 12:30 Seoul time (03:00-04:30 CET)
This session will focus on the contributions of water-centred sustainable forest management, or SFM with the provision of water services as a main management objective, to achieving the SDGs. Specifically, the focus will be on improving integration of water in forest management and how to maximize the outputs from the forest-water nexus at different scales and landscapes from the mountains to plains and rivers. The session will explore questions such as how forests provide water-related benefits and how do we manage them? The session organizers and partners will also look ahead and deliberate how these contributions can be up-scaled and what kind of barriers need to be overcome.
The objective is to demonstrate how the forest-water nexus, and specifically water-centred SFM, is key to achieving the SDGs. Landscape approaches that have the provision of water services as one of the main management objectives are increasingly being implemented as a form of SFM, as they go beyond the boundaries of traditional forest management by focusing on the range of co-benefits that come from this focus. In order for water-centred SFM to make an effective contribution to the achievement of the SDGs, it is vital to strengthen technical cooperation between all levels of society. This includes governments and organizations, regional departments and corporations, as well as local and indigenous community members.
To view the session's brief and call to action please click here.
Please check this site in the coming days for the recording of the session and the answers to the questions posed during the session.
