Managing Water for the City of the Future

Useful Links

European Union Research – Framework Programmes 5 and 6
Collaborations with other Global Projects and Initiatives
Complimentary Research Programmes

European Union Research – Framework Programmes 5 and 6

The 5th Community Research Framework Programme (FP5, 1998-2002) represented a turning point in European water research. During its implementation strategic emphasis was attached on integrated water resources management, based on multi-disciplinary/ stakeholder problem solving approaches and support to relevant EU policies, and in particular the Water Framework and associated directives and the EU Strategy for Sustainable Development.

The 6th Community Research Framework Programme (FP6, 2002-2006) consolidates further the acquired knowledge, by funding research in new concepts, strategies and tools for the mitigation of global change impact on water resources in Europe and worldwide, in conformity with the vision of the European Research Area (ERA). An overall budget of 188m Euro has been allocated by the European Commission to 58 projects. FP6 is seeking to mobilise wider and lasting partnerships among knowledge communities in Europe and international co-operation partner countries, building on existing foundations of decades of scientific cooperation in water research.

SWITCH is building on the knowledge of other EU research programs and collaborating with relevant existing projects to extend the impact of the EU Framework initiative. For more information about the EU projects which SWITCH links with, please click on the project titles below:

ANTINOMOS (A knowledge network for solving real life water problems in developing countries European Union Coordinated Action (Globalisation, Industry and Urban Development))
AQUASTRESS
CITYNET (The Network of European Research Projects on Integrated Urban Water Management)
NETSSAF (Network for the development of Sustainable Approaches for large scale implementation of Sanitation in Africa, Coordination Action)
NEWATER (New Approaches to Adaptive Water Management under Uncertainty)
RECLAIM (Water Reclamation Technologies for safe Artificial Groundwater Recharge)
ROSA (Resourced Oriented Sanitation concepts for peri-urban areas in Africa)
SCENES (Water Scenario for Europe and Neighbouring States)
SLIM (Freude am Fluss)
SPLASH (EUWI ERA-NET – European Union Water Initiative European Research Area Network)
SWURVE (Sustainable Water: Uncertainty, Risk and Vulnerability in Europe)
TECHNEAU (Technology Enables Universal Access to Safe Water)

More information can be found at:
http://ec.europa.eu/research/fp6/index_en.cfm.

Collaborations with other Global Projects and Initiatives

IWA (International Water Association)
RUAF (Resource centres on Urban Agricultural and Food security)
The RUAF Foundation is an international network of Resource centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security conformed by ETC Foundation (the Netherlands), IPES – Promoción del Desarrollo Sostenible (Lima, Peru), Institut Africain de Gestion Urbaine (Dakar, Senegal), International Water Management Institute – subregional office West Africa (Accra, Ghana), Municipal Development Partnership (Harare, Zimbabwe), International Water Management Institute – regional office India, Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resource Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (China) and the Environment and Sustainable Development Unit of the American University of Beirut.

The mission of the RUAF Foundation is "to contribute to urban poverty reduction, employment generation and food security and to stimulate participatory city governance and improved urban environmental management, by creating enabling conditions for empowerment of male and female urban and peri-urban farmers, capacity development of local authorities and other stakeholders and by facilitating the integration of urban agriculture in gender-sensitive policies and action programmes of local governments, civic society organisations and private enterprises with active involvement of the urban farmers, livestock keepers and other relevant stakeholders".

SWITCH and RUAF activities are linked in Beijing, Lima and Accra. In 2008 RUAF and SWITCH collaborated in the development of a joint issue of the Urban Agriculture Magazine.
SuSanA (Sustainable Sanitation Alliance)
UNESCO-IHP (UNESCO-International Hydrological Programme)
U21 (Universitas 21)
U21 is an international network of 21 leading research-intensive universities in 13 countries. Collectively, its members enrol over 650,000 students, employ over 130,000 staff and have over 2 million alumni. The network's purpose is to facilitate collaboration and cooperation between the member universities and to create opportunities for them on a scale that none of them would be able to achieve operating independently or through traditional bilateral alliances. One of the areas of research collaboration is in Interdisciplinary research to improve the water sustainability of cities. A U21 network on Water Futures for Sustainable Cities was established in 2007 and has been collaborating with SWITCH members at Birmingham University and Unesco IHE since that time. Currently, investigating joint postgraduate training between U21 and the SWITCH postgraduate research school.

Complimentary Research Programmes

Other programmes which are complementary to SWITCH and some of the larger research agencies around the world conducting major research streams on IUWM include:

CSIR South Africa (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research)
CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation)
CRUE ERA-Net (European Flood Risk Management Research)
CSIRO's Water for a Healthy Country – Urban Water and Energy Transformed Flagship programmes are major National research initiatives in Australia that bring together researchers and practitioners in the majors Australian cities to tackle climate change, urbanisation and move toward sustainable urban water management.
Fraunhofer Institut