Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation Hani Sweilam held a virtual meeting on Sunday with Osama Abdel Khalek, Egypt’s Permanent Representative to the UN in New York; and Ahmed Gamal El-Din, Egypt’s Permanent Representative to the UN and other international organisations in Geneva.
The meeting aimed to discuss the current and future measures that Egypt is taking to activate the provisions of the initiative to adapt to climate change in the water sector, which was officially launched by Egypt during the recently concluded UN Conference of Parties on Climate Change’s (COP27) Water Day.
Sweilam also pointed to the great success achieved by water activities during the COP27 in drawing the attention of the international community to water issues and their relationship to climate change, which was the result of the efforts of Egypt and its partners over the past several months, emphasising that this success is only the beginning of a course of work and projects that must be undertaken on the ground to adapt to climate changes, especially in Africa.
Furthermore, he explained that the international initiative for adaptation in the water sector received great support from various governments and international organisations during the climate conference, which must be built upon to start moving forward towards taking the necessary measures to activate this initiative on the ground, as Egypt began communicating with international partners to formulate projects in the field of adaptation in developing countries.
Additionally, the minister noted that during the next few months, the necessary procedural steps will be taken to start the actual implementation of the initiative, as the goals and projects for the initiative will be determined, the organizational structure will be set, and the initiative’s secretariat will be formed by January 2023.
Next up, in March, the initiative’s action plan will be developed and the projects of the initiative will be announced during the UN mid-term review conference that is scheduled to be held in March 2023.
