UNESCO-IHP, AGWA, ICIWaRM, & Partners Organizing Conference on "Bottom-Up" Adaptation

Over the past ten-plus years, various organizations have developed a set of complementary resilient water management tools and approaches that work to address climate risks and other uncertainties in a manner that can be integrated within existing planning, design, and operational decision processes. These "bottom-up approaches" have been heavily promoted within the AGWA network and include CRIDA, the World Bank Decision Tree Framework, Decision Scaling, and Adaptation Pathways, among others.

UNESCO-IHP, AGWA, ICIWaRM, and several other institutions have decided to organize a conference to enhance the understanding and visibility of bottom-up approaches for climate resilience, with particular attention given to the special role of climate finance, private sector involvement, and their potential in addressing global climate and development agendas. The event will be geared towards policy and decision makers and water managers, with input from practitioners as well as private and finance sector representatives. Conference dates are tentatively set for early November. The current COVID-19 pandemic will be closely monitored in order to ensure the viability of an in-person conference later this year.


The objectives of this conference are:

  1. to introduce participants to the technical and practical components of bottom-up approaches for climate adaptation;

  2. to share a global set of case studies;

  3. to identify the policies and institutional capacity needed to more widely incorporate these approaches within national climate programs, climate finance, and the private sector;

  4. to present the outcome of the conference to the policy community at COP-26. The conference will also contribute to the formulation of strategies for the 9th Phase of IHP (IHP-IX; 2022-2029).

More generally, topics will include:

  • local and catchment-level needs;

  • governance and capacity;

  • project implementation;

  • Implications outside the water community.

In the lead up to the conference, the organizing team has proposed a series of webinars to utilize web-based outreach and information sharing. Webinars will begin as soon as early May. Details on upcoming webinars and the conference will be shared on the AGWA website and other channels.

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