2008

Sustainable Sanitation and Groundwater, Hannover/Germany, 14 - 17 October 2008

From 14-17 October 2008, the German Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (BGR) convened the international symposium on “Coupling Sustainable Sanitation and Groundwater Protection” in Hannover, Germany, in order to highlight the immense problems of groundwater pollution due to absent or inadequate sanitation facilities in developing countries. Together with international co-convenors (BMZ, UNEP and WHO) and supporting organizations (BORDA, DED, DWA, GTZ, IAH, KfW and TTZ), BGR offered this symposium as the first event dealing with both topics. About 130 participants from more than 30 countries discussed the links between sustainable sanitation and groundwater protection. A comprehensive poster exhibition covered a vast variety of lessons learnt, mainly from developing countries. The symposium was one of the activities of BGR realized within the framework of the Sustainable Sanitation Alliance.

The International Conference titled "Pathways towards Sustainable Sanitation in Africa" constitutes the most relevant event held under the project NETSSAF "Network for the development of Sustainable Sanitation in Africa", a Coordination Action supported by the European Union under the Sixth Framework Programme (FP6). A well prepared team organised this event successfully which was celebrated in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, from the 24th to the 27th of September of 2008.

Report on SuSanA activities@IWA conference Vienna, Sept. 2008 The 6. IWA World Water Congress and Exhibition took place from 7.-12. September 2008 at the Austria Centre in Vienna. It brought together about 4.500 international water / wastewater professionals and visitors, who discussed the latest developments in sustainable water and wastewater management and offered the possibility to exchange knowledge.

The conference was deliberately aimed to create a dialogue between civil, process, agricultural and environmental engineers; urban planners, sociologists, economists, and political scientists who are involved in international sanitation research and implementation. Furthermore, this conference tried to bridge the gap between sanitation research and demonstration in the ‘North’ and in the ‘South’. Among others, the conference wanted to be a platform to present the findings of the ‘Decentralized Sanitation and Reuse’ (DESAR) project performed in the Netherlands from 2001-2007, financed by EET and STOWA and those of a sanitation and urban infrastructure research project in East Africa (PROVIDE).

Improve Food Security – Combine Productive Sanitation, Conservation Agriculture and Water Harvesting (Sunday 17 August - Afternoon Seminar)

Content taken from the World Water Week website

Convenors: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), German Agency for Technical Cooperation (GTZ), International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), International Centre for Soil Fertility and Agricultural Development (IFDC), International Water Management Institute (IWMI), Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), United Nations Convention to Combat Desertifi cation (UNCCD) and Sustainable Sanitation Alliance (SuSanA)

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