On 23 and 24 November 2009, the city of Lyon hosted a conference whose aim was to prepare the contribution of local and regional authorities for the Water Strategy of the Union of the Mediterranean. The meeting was organized by the UCLG Committee for the Mediterranean, the MEDEM and Grand Lyon. The meeting counted over 200 participants, among them, elected local leaders and technical specialists from the South, East, and North of the Mediterranean. Among the donors present were the European Investment Bank, African Development Bank, the European Commission, and the French Development Office, who learned of the seven projects selected for approval by the Union for the Mediterranean. These institutions, as well as international organizations such as the OECD, expressed their interest in working with a view to supporting local and regional authorities on water issues.
Water management constitutes a major stake for local and regional authorities and other related partners in the sustainable development of the Mediterranean, and particularly on its southern and eastern shores.
Pierre Schapira, Paris’s Deputy Mayor for international and Francophone relations, participated in the closing of workshops to present the contribution of local and regional authorities in the Water Strategy of the Union for the Mediterranean. This document, which was approved by the participants as a whole, takes four key themes as its basis: water governance, water and financing, management of the demand for water, and adaptation to climate change. Mr. Schapira officially presented this contribution to the representative of the Presidency of the Union for the Mediterranean restating the demand of local and regional authorities to have their perspective included in the strategy, which shall be adopted in Spain in April 2010.
‘Our contribution here is proof of our engagement in constructing an area of peace and security around the water issue, but also our commitment to improve services and to ensure high quality services for our fellow citizens in the North, South, and East of the Mediterranean. Our contribution takes into account the particularities of our territories and also the major current upheavals such as climate change. We ask nation-states to consider and integrate it into the Water Strategy of the Union for the Mediterranean which will be discussed and adopted at the next ministerial conference of the Union for the Mediterranean in April 2010, in Spain,’ declared Mr. Schapira.
Marc Strauss, the representative for the Minister of State Jean Louis Borloo, confirmed that this contribution would be presented to the Presidency of the Union for the Mediterranean for inclusion in the Water Strategy:
"Mr. Borloo, as Co-President of the Union for the Mediterranean, and in line with the Egyptian and Swedish Co-presidents, will convey your contribution to the relevant bodies of the Union. They will feed the work underway, under the direction of Spain, to build the Mediterranean Water Strategy, which will be presented to ministers at their second conference on water, which is scheduled to take place in Barcelona on 13 and 14 April 2010."