Achieving food security in the future while using water resources in a sustainable manner will be a major challenge for us and the next generations. We will need to produce more crop per drop of water. The SDG on water (SDG 6) will very likely include a target on increasing water-use efficiencies in all sectors. Considering that the agricultural sector is a key water user and water availability and use will also impact SDG 2 on food security, careful monitoring of water productivity and exploring possible opportunities to increase it will be required. But how can we monitor the performance of water use in agriculture?

FAO is developing a publicly accessible near real time database using satellite data that will allow monitoring of agricultural water productivity. This database can be used to propose solutions to reduce water productivity gaps while taking into account ecosystems services and the equitable use of water resources. Eventually, the proposed solutions should lead to an overall reduction of water stress. The discussion will focus on the approach followed and to which extent the data generated can be used in practice by policy makers, water managers and farmers. 

At the side event, FAO's Water Senior Officer on Water Policy, Jean-Marc Faurès will focus on the goal and approach of Water Productivity monitoring and reporting to SDG 6.4. Wim Bastiaanssen (UNESCO-IHE) will focus on remote sensing techniques to identify possibilities to increase water productivity under sustainable river basin water resource conditions. Andre Roux (department of Agriculture South Africa) will provide a concrete case from South Africa regarding both irrigated as well as rain fed agriculture, and Jeremy Bird (IWMI) will close the side event by sharing his vision on up-scaling best practices. The speakers and Job Kleijn (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of The Netherlands) will be in the panel to answer all your questions afterwards. 

This side event will take place on Sunday 23 August between 16:00-17:30 at the World Water Week in Stockholm in Room FH 307.