5 December 2012: Specialists from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay met to design a regional agenda for the La Plata Basin on water risk management in agricultural systems and integrate it into the basin’s Strategic Program of Actions (SAP).

The specialists met on 23 November 2012, in the context of a Meeting of the Control of Land Degradation Thematic Group at the Buenos Aires headquarters of the Intergovernmental Coordinating Committee (CIC) of the Countries of the La Plata Basin.

After a presentation by an invited expert from Colombia University’s International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI), the experts offered their assessment of the water vulnerability of their agricultural sectors in the basin and exchanged ideas about what measures might be taken address it, particularly how to incorporate knowledge of climate variability in the decision making of farmers.

The group agreed on the following priorities for the common agenda: identifying regional coordination mechanisms to strengthen or create; highlighting institutional and logistical aspects of risk management; promoting the exchange of local and international experiences; facilitating the transfer of tools and technologies; and training. The group agreed to meet again in 2013 to further develop the agenda.

The SAP and the work on water risk management forms part of the 2010-2015 Framework Program for the Sustainable Management of the Water Resources of the La Plata Basin, in Relation to the Effects of Climate Change and Variability, which is funded by the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), implemented by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and executed by CIC with administrative and technical support from Organization of American States (OAS). [La Plata Framework Programme Press Release (in Spanish)]