High-level officials invited by French President call for implementation of international commitments for water

Prince of Monaco Albert II, President of Niger Mahamadou Issoufou, Prime Minister of South Korea Hwang-Sik Kim and former president of the Soviet Union (1985-1991) Mikhail Gorbachev have closed the Forum's opening ceremony. All seek to promote practical water-related initiatives, especially in developing countries.

If all the earth's water were stored in a 5-litre container, available fresh water would not quite fill a tablespoon.

Hwang-Sik Kim, Prime Minister of South Korea, the next World Water Forum's host country, drew on this statement to introduce the question of improved water resource management. In order to address this issue, intimately linked to water scarcity problems, the prestigious speakers all insisted on the involvement of populations and civil society as a priority.

In Niger, water is a specific thematic area in the National Youth Forum's agenda. Mikhail Gorbatchev, founding president of the international NGO Green Cross, also calls for better civil society participation. Environmental aspects are essential to water management. As Prince Albert II points out, the Mediterranean region is currently threatened by climate change, sea acidification and biodiversity loss.

The situation seems even more alarming in Niger, where Chad lake has shrunk from a surface area of 25,000km² in the 1960s to 1,500km² today. However, effective action can still be taken. In South Korea, a rehabilitation project targeting four important rivers addressed the lack of water and led to a significant decrease of flooding.

Importance of international cooperation

The four speakers insist on the importance of increased cooperation on water issues, both on a regional and international scale, as well as increased capitalisation and knowledge dissemination. The Prince Albert II Foundation  acts notably through the Euro-Mediterranean Water Think Tank, which aims at encouraging dialogue on sustainable and integrated water resource management in the Mediterranean basin. In Niger, on January 2012, an initiative, "A l'eau l'Afrique, à l'eau le monde" allowed for the mobilisation of six countries of the sub-region to prepare for the 6th World Water Forum. The Prime Minister of South Korea mentioned important agreements on infrastructures recently signed between five countries of the Mekong basin.

Although the senior officials highlight the importance of international summit meetings, they were emphatic that concrete actions are then needed. Because water is a cross-cutting issue, it is imperative that it is at the heart of upcoming international environmental summits, like Earth Summit 2012 (Rio+20).uncsd2012.org/ .