the_bridge_tank, auteur sur The Bridge Tank

Rethinking Hydro-Diplomacy: The Bridge Tank holds a high-level panel on the side of the UN-Water Summit on Groundwater 2022

Posted on 8 December 20228 December 2022 by the_bridge_tank

On December 6^th, 2022, The Bridge Tank held a high level panel discussion on hydro-diplomacy in Paris, on the side of the UN-Water Summit on Groundwater 2022, coordinated by UNESCO.

This event was placed under the high patronage of:

Mrs. Irina Bokova

Co-chair of the International Science Council’s Global Commission on Science Missions for Sustainability and Former Director General of UNESCO

Mr. Erik Orsenna

Chairman of the Initiative for the Future of Great Rivers (IAGF) and Academician at Académie Française

Context

The conference focussed on “Rethinking Hydro-diplomacy: International Rivers as Instruments for Peace. Shared experiences, solutions, and sustainable resources management” and was organised and consciously positioned in the context of the United Nations’ renewed focus on water. The 2023 UN Water Conference planned in New York, in March, will be the first event of this kind since 1977.

As issues of water wars and conflicts rise in prominence due to increased hydric stress around the globe, hydro-diplomacy is bound to be a crucial subject in the years and decades to come. Following the recent release of our policy brief, which called for a renewed and enlarged practice of hydro-diplomacy, this conference represented the logical continuation of The Bridge Tank’s wish to position itself and contribute to the field and practice of hydro-diplomacy.

Objectives of the conference

Convinced that hydro-diplomacy is not only the practice of diplomats and state entities, the conference aimed to offer a reflexion and exchange on the development of tools for hydro-diplomacy and towards the de-escalation of water-related conflicts.

The Bridge Tank thus convened this panel to gather like-minded people dedicated to a better approach and management of water resources. These included esteemed policy and decision makers, aid and humanitarian organizations, researchers, legal experts, and practitioners involved in water-related issues.

The event was held in hybrid format, allowing for a participants from across the globe to share their experiences, success stories, case studies, and the challenges they encountered. Participants joined from Abidjan, Brussels, Conakry, Dhaka, Geneva, Marrakesh, Oslo, Paris, Skopje, Tashkent, and Tokyo.

Valuable discussions on water and hydro-diplomacy

The conference started with an introductory session setting the stage for the day by providing an overview of the existing international system in place on questions of water and introducing existing hydro-diplomacy initiatives and experiences from non-conflictual and integrated development water co-management. These introductory remarks stressed the need to approach water from a wider point of view, as a societal issue requiring shared and multi-stakeholder solutions and approaches. Co-operation is particularly needed in response to environmental and ecological threats on the one hand and to contribute to global peace by reducing the risks of violent escalation and water conflicts on the other.

The first thematic session of the day gave the floor to political decision makers from around the globe for them to share and discuss their experience with water and its management. Key messages included a call for solidarity of actions between all stakeholders in the face of crises and the need to listen to and believe local communities. Participants here again underlined the need to address water issues in a holistic way, an idea which requires an integrated approach to water management. Other key points raised included the need to combine both local management with a larger scientific worldview and understanding.

The second thematic session turned to international aid and development actors. From their field knowledge and experience in development, participants mentioned the inter-connectedness of issues, as water is a factor and entry point to food security, health and early childhood development, energy development, disaster risk management, climate change, and questions of transport. The need for an integrated and multi-lateral approach to water on the one hand and the importance of local and community action on the other also found resonance during this session. Transboundary governance however necessarily requires political will to move forward. A final but crucial point addressed by multiple contributors was the role education and knowledge of the water resource in order to ensure better maintenance and management of river basins.

Finally, the last thematic session took on the task of discussing the diversity of tools at the service of hydro-diplomacy. Participants here again encouraged a community based approach, starting at the local level, to develop solutions tailored to the communities’ needs. The examples of River Basin Organisation must thus be understood in their variety, as their diverse forms are the result of the diversity of needs and functions they fulfil. The centrality of knowledge, data, and scientific research as necessary prerequisites for action were addressed by participants of this session as well. In addition to that, the ideas of shared infrastructure and shared water information systems were noted as promising tools for hydro-diplomacy.

Key takeaways of the conference

From the valuable contributions of the conference’s many participants and the lively discussions throughout the day, a diversity of approaches to hydro-diplomacy transpired, allowing for the establishment of what could be defined as a taxonomy of hydro-diplomacy.

We identified 3 key lessons learned:

1. A first aspect of hydro-diplomacy is found in its fundamentally diplomatic dimension, through its role in conflict prevention and de-escalation. Participants agreed to recall the classical approach of international law, which remains very much rooted in water issues.

2. From this early assessment, numerous contributions stressed the centrality of political will in hydro-diplomacy. Testimonies and experiences from across the globe provided ample proof that hydro-diplomacy initiatives like River Basin Organisations (RBOs) can be successful vectors of peace, cooperation, and sustainable management of water resources. However, all these initiatives and transboundary organisations presuppose and require political will.

Discussions on how to generate this necessary political strongly focussed on a bottom-up approach, which in turn underlined the importance of local action and what could be called Track II hydro-diplomacy. Civil society’s knowledge and activity in the preservation of riverine and water resources combined with the exchanges between practitioners and scientists from different countries offer the foundational track II hydro-diplomacy needed to generate political will at the level of decision makers.

From there, political will can be triggered through the interaction of the scientific and practitioner communities on the one hand and political decision makers on the other. As however pointed out by participants, bridging the gap between scientists and decision makers is not without challenges. Interactions between these two communities aimed at ensuring an increased commitment to hydro-diplomacy require aligning messages and preoccupations of both communities. There is therefore a real need for scientists to not only communicate the scientific importance and relevance of hydro-diplomacy and of an approach to water resources built on cooperation and co-management but also to stress its political importance. Hydric stress endangers entire communities in their livelihoods, creating insecurity, and accelerating both internal and international migration.

Mobilising science and putting it at the service of policy making and the generation of political will has therefore been one of the key questions and preoccupations raised throughout the day.

3. A last dimension of this taxonomy of hydro-diplomacy which emerged throughout the conference was centred on the diversity of tools, processes, and institutions of shared management of water resources as well as discussions about their replicability.

River Basin Organisations are notable examples of such institutions and developers of tools towards an improved management and sharing of transboundary water resources. With examples from the Senegal River, representatives from the Netherlands and France discussing the shared management of the Rhine River, perspectives from both Pakistan and India on the Indus River, as well as contributions from Uzbekistan with the example of Central Asia, the conference revealed the diversity of approaches and structures of RBOs and shared management agreements.

Participants from the realm of development agencies addressed the question of replicability of RBOs by noting the comparative advantages of certain structures over others. They however also pointed out that each national and transboundary context, geography, and concrete local and regional needs require adapting the structure and form of RBOs.

One final but crucial point raised was that cooperation fundamentally requires the sharing and pooling of knowledge and information. While it is important to respect national and regional sovereignty, global and transboundary issues like climate change and increased hydric stress call for global and multilateral solutions. Creating transboundary solidary and cooperation is necessarily achieved through the sharing of data.

A renewed and enlarged practice of hydro-diplomacy thus requires a durable platform of exchange between all stakeholders, bridging the gap between the scientific community, local water practitioners, and political decision makers. Honouring its name and mission statement, The Bridge Tank offers to provide this missing bridge and to host such a platform of exchange and connection.

This conference provided a first example of The Bridge Tank’s dedication to the matter and is hoped to become an annual occurence as the “World Water for Peace Conference.”

Read the concept note and the agenda of the day here.

COP 27: Advances on loss and damage but no breakthrough on climate finance despite a strong West African involvement

Posted on 25 November 202225 November 2022 by the_bridge_tank

The fear of ending COP 27 without any significant advances was looming over Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, in the dying hours of this year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference.

But after a final negotiations marathon between the parties, a deal was eventually struck.

The agreement which concluded two weeks of discussions and negotiations in the Egyptian coastal city offered an important step forward in the contentious question of loss and damage. Parties agreed to establish a loss and damage fund which will help support those countries most impacted by climate change. The fund will provide financial relief to respond to the catastrophic effects of the environmental crisis, like droughts, heatwaves, floods, or cyclones.

Efforts Remain Insufficient

While encouraging as a signal of international solidarity in response to environmental catastrophes, the final agreement fell short of many COP 27 participants’ expectations and hopes. In an interview for TV5 Monde, Hakima El Haite, board member of The Bridge Tank, expressed her disappointment with the lack of advances at COP 27:

“It is true that we have taken a step forward by agreeing on the creation of a mechanism that will still require time. The more we mitigate CO2 emissions and the more we reduce CO2 concentrations, the less we will need to adapt and the less money we will need to repair the damages caused by natural disasters. And so we have to act and it’s not up to the vulnerable countries to act, it’s the emitting countries that emit 80% of the emissions that have to provide 80% of the solutions in their own countries.”

This opinion was shared by many, particularly in the Global South and West Africa, a region which faces some of the most dire effects of climate change and which had come with strong demands and expectations to COP 27, the African COP.

A Strong and Proactive West African Presence at COP 27

Representatives from West African countries had arrived at COP 27 with the hope of seeing strong decisions being made to relieve the environmental pressure affecting the continent. Before the beginning of COP 27, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) had shared some of the points it considered crucial to successful climate change negotiations:

Increasing the ambition of greenhouse gas emission reduction, specifically for the biggest emitters
Article 6 of the Paris Agreement with regard to generating new financing opportunities in the region and defining the new carbon market mechanisms
Adaptation: moving from planning to operationalizing
Loss and damage: providing concrete responses to the existing loss and damage in West Africa
Climate finance: meeting the 100-billion-dollar target of the Green Climate Fund and establishing a financial facility specifically dedicated to African countries to focus on their needs and priorities in terms of adaptation.

Intent on making the sub-region’s voice heard at COP 27, West African institutions joined forces in Sharm el-Sheikh at the West Africa Pavilion. This pavilion was co-piloted by ECOWAS and the West African Development Bank (WADB), in partnership with the West African Economic and Monetary Union (WAEMU) and the Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control in the Sahel (CILSS).

“The pavilion expresses the willingness of regional institutions to strengthen their cooperation around the common challenge of climate change. The approach aims to improve the coordination and effectiveness of the collective response for the benefit of the region’s populations,” ECOWAS communicated prior to the conference.

For two weeks, the four West African institutions thus contributed to moving public debate on climate action and climate finance forward.

Leading voices on climate governance and climate finance

The ECOWAS Commission made use of its presence at the West Africa Pavilion to organize side events introducing the union’s Regional Climate Strategy. These included a session on November 9^th on coordination mechanisms for greater regional climate governance and another one on November 11^th on the sectoral opportunities the strategy offers for agriculture and energy.

The West African Development Bank (WADB) was also very active on the Pavilion. On November 9^th, Serge Ekué, President of the WADB, gave a press briefing on the WADB’s climate positioning. This was an opportunity to discuss the WADB’s Djoliba 2021-2025 Strategic Development Plan, which allocates 25% of the bank’s total commitments to climate finance in order to support member states in the financing of their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). Through its president, the WADB expressed its wish to be a catalyser of resilience and adaptation to climate change and a facilitator of sustainable and stable growth.

Capitalizing on the centrality of climate finance at this year’s climate change conference, the WADB organised a number of events on the matter, including a panel on “Challenges and opportunities of climate finance in Africa,” and two sessions on November 14^th, “Filling the Gaps in Climate Change Adaptation Policies to Facilitate Access to Climate Finance for WAEMU Countries” and “Carbon finance as a lever of development for WAEMU countries,” with the participation of the West African Alliance On Carbon Market and Climate Finance.

The WADB also took part in side-events organised by other institutions in Sharm el Sheikh, including one by the Green Climate Fund on the Great Green Wall for the Sahara and Sahel.

This importance of climate finance on this year’s agenda at COP 27 also mobilised The Bridge Tank, which co-organised a side event with Liberal International on North-South dynamics in climate finance. The panel discussion “Towards a balanced, empowered, North-South blended climate finance for mitigation and adaptation” included prominent figures and institutions from West Africa and provided an additional building bloc to the pursuit of a more effective and balanced climate finance.

Despite these many efforts and calls for bold measures, COP 27’s final agreement comes as a disappointing conclusion to two weeks of active involvement on the ground from West African institutions and countries. The wish to make COP 27, the African COP, an important milestone in the fight against climate change and the establishment of climate finance mechanisms ensuring the continent’s preservation has been left unfulfilled, to the frustration of many.

COP 27: From Distrust to Trust: Towards a balanced, empowered North-South blended climate finance for mitigation and adaptation

Posted on 18 November 202221 November 2022 by the_bridge_tank

As COP 27 slowly draws to a close, The Bridge Tank continues its efforts in favour of climate justice in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.

On Thursday, November 17^th, 2022, The Bridge Tank and Liberal International joined forces to organise a side event on climate finance – “Towards a balanced, empowered, North-South blended climate finance for mitigation and adaptation.” The Bridge Tank was represented by Dr. Joel Ruet, President, and our board member Dr. Hakima ElHaite, President of Liberal International.

The Bridge Tank made use of its long experience on the topic of climate finance, having contributed to the Task Force on “Climate change and finance” of the T20 for the past 6 years.

Participants to the panel included Ms. Kadiatou N’Diaye, former Minister of the Environment, Water, and Forest of Guinea, representatives of the Brazzaville Foundation, directors of the Agricultural Bank of Niger, and the President of the Egyptian conservative party.

The panel discussion addressed the current state of climate finance and adaptation finance. While a doubling of efforts for the latter was included in the Glasgow Climate Pact, bringing adaptation finance from around USD 20 billion to USD 40 billion, many challenges remain, as some of the wealthiest countries are not keeping their side of the bargain.

The President of the Congo Basin Blue Fund thus left COP 27 to denounce this lack of financial support. In 2021, US President Joe Biden pledged USD 50 million to the Adaptation Fund but the contribution never materialised. This year, Biden increased the United States’ promise to USD 100 million. The example of the Congo Basin is emblematic of the gap between institutional promises and the actual reality on the ground.

Today’s USD 82 billion in climate finance for the Global South are 60% of private loans. Despite facing the most dire effects of the current environmental crisis, the African continent only receives 5% of these funds. This shows “neither a form of obligation nor of solidarity”, claimed Hakima el Haite. The political consensus in the Global South is therefore that funds are lacking, which is all the more alarming when considering the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) forecast that only 8 years are left before the situation becomes critical.

Having established that, the panel discussed concrete ways of adapting financial tools to make for a more efficient and balanced climate finance. Some of the main challenges raised here were the difficulties of accreditation for the Green Climate Fund and the Adaptation Fund. Mobilising necessary funds was likened to an uphill battle. While being indeed accessible, the mobilisation of sums around USD 10 million is slowed down by protracted procedures. The challenge is even greater for scale up projects with funding needs in the hundreds of millions USD.

The panel thus sought to find innovative funding sources and efficient disbursement channels.

Profit sharing agreements could be one possibility. These would require national frameworks for private contracts establishing profit sharing agreements where private and public funding would be poured into a common public fund dedicated to concrete projects. This procedure is for example already used by oil companies.

Despite only being a parallel mechanism, carbon credits could also include a direct transfer to public assistance beneficiaries.

Discussions on alternative financing seem to have abandoned the idea of taxation of the Global North since COP21-22. Solidarity is therefore not an appropriate description of the current financial processes. With 80% of African oil production being operated by foreign companies, the USD 100-billion climate finance pledge should be defined as a debt the North owes the South. But the current climate finance’s reliance on loans has the opposite effect, creating additional South to North debt.

Other ideas are centred around a renewed system of governance. The lack of bankability, transparency and competence associated with the Global South reflects the North’s lack of confidence in the South. While challenges to co-management and co-financing are also partly found in a mismanagement of African resources and wealth, which impedes its ability to effectively finance adaptation and mitigation itself, new mechanisms must be developed to turn this North-South defiance into mutual confidence.

Establishing incubators working towards large-scale structuring projects could be one way of achieving this. Working on co-management and co-governance is thus an encouraging prospect, as it is already well established within other structures, e.g. business angels or investment funds.

Another key point discussed on the panel was the idea of reversing conditionalities and for Africa to have the power to impose conditionalities. These could for example include the requirement for funders to be present on the ground and thereby encourage the emergence of local research departments and local development companies. One main challenge is therefore for both states and international funders to support the emergence of African and sub-regional multinational companies.

The issues of human resources and insufficient administrative capacity building in the South must also be connected to the complexity of international procedures. Encouraging signs can be found in the successful examples of the Micro Finance Program of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) which facilitates administrative procedures.

Finally, questions of innovative bottom-up finance provided another key talking point to the panel. To ensure complex assets have simpler assets as securities, a pan-African fund of security and risk mitigation would be needed.

The question of land guarantees also needs careful attention in order to develop a system which would aim, for example, for projects to be funded at 95% through grants and 5% coming from the community or guaranteed by private banks. The question remains whether these would be accepted by bilateral agencies.

Nevertheless, commercial banks, as the example of Niger shows, are ready to go ahead with such projects because of the emergency to take action. Every year Niger loses 100,000 ha to desertification, making the need for funding all the more pressing.

The Bridge Tank continues its involvement on hydrogen at COP 27 through a high-level panel on African Green Hydrogen Hubs

Posted on 17 November 202218 November 2022 by the_bridge_tank

The Bridge Tank’s continued engagement on questions of hydrogen has put it at the forefront of public debate on the matter. Over the years, this has resulted in a number of publications on hydrogen (our report & our policy brief), and led to The Bridge Tank being the only think tank invited to the launch of the Hydrogen Council in Davos, in 2017.

This active involvement and expertise on hydrogen was once again put to use during this second week of COP 27 in Egypt.

The Bridge Tank, represented by Dr. Joel Ruet, President, and Dr. Hakima el Haite, board member, took part in a high level panel discussion co-organised by the International Solar Alliance and Liberal International on “Energy, Green Hydrogen in Africa; Perspectives for Solutions” in Sharm el Sheikh, on November 15^th, 2022.

The meeting brought together prominent leaders from the political sphere to establish strategies for the African continent to sustainably harness its existing resources and meet its growing energy demand, while following a sustainable path to a net-zero future and delivering on the Sustainable Development Goals. This energy demand is a necessary component of the continent’s economic development and offers a way to lift many of its citizens out of poverty.

Participants to this high-level panel discussion included representatives from various government organizations, private sector actors, political figures, and members of the French and American press. Among these were the CEO of the Namibia Investment Promotion and Development Board, advisor to the President of Namibia, a representative of the Minister of Energy of Mauritania, a representative of the National Agency for Renewable Energies of Senegal, and the Vice-President of the Energy Commission of the Parliament of Portugal.

Further participants included the Secretary General of the International Youth Nuclear Congress (IYNC), the Director General of Energies 2050, and various members of Liberal International and investment representatives.

The discussions built on a presentation provided by the International Solar Alliance (ISA), which offered insights into a study on the possible development of green hydrogen hubs in Africa by 2030-2035. Financed by the European Investment Bank and supported by Liberal International, this study was conducted by the ISA, an organisation of about 120 nations launched in 2015 by Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, and Francois Hollande, Former President of France.

The study provides an innovative approach to green hydrogen production and hydrogen export perspectives for African countries, defining the creation of a local market as a necessary prerequisite for a stable long-term export strategy. This local hydrogen market would rely on a local industrial demand from “hard-to-abate” sectors (e.g. for the steel industry, ammonia production, energy, or mining), for which decarbonation is of intrinsic value.

Green hydrogen would be produced through water electrolysis making use of solar energy. With water being a rare commodity in the region, the strategy plans to make use of desalinated sea water. Production sites would therefore be near the sea and create local hydrogen ecosystems with industrial sites.

The energy needed for desalination would be covered by the produced green hydrogen, making for a cost- and energy-efficient production method. It would also be possible to desalinate more water than is needed for hydrogen production. This water could then be used for irrigation or be directly incorporated in urban water supplies, alleviating water stress on the African continent.

This plan is no mere abstraction but presents concrete and proven opportunities, as 14 such plants are currently being developed by HyDeal in Spain and Portugal.

Exporting hydrogen to Europe would thus only be a factor of interest at a later stage, after the establishment of a resilient and effective hydrogen ecosystem at the local level.

While many national strategies and studies focus on Africa’s potential as a producer and exporter of green hydrogen to Europe, this study provides the missing link to the establishment of such a production. It offers a way to secure and stabilise early local production through the creation of a domestic market. The potential of hydrogen would thus firstly be harvested for domestic consumption and industrial use within African countries before being used for exports.

In addition to that, this approach would create efficient and stable hydrogen ecosystems, relying on greater acceptance by the local population and industrial actors. This in turns provides national green hydrogen export programs with increased stability, granting them a strategic autonomy which would free them from a dependency of the international market, price variations, or uncertainty surrounding electrolyser technologies.

On the European side, this strategy would also allow economic hedging and greater scale-up efficiency.

The study offers a detailed and methodologically comparable assessment of possible hydrogen hubs in Africa. While it was primarily conducted in Egypt, Namibia, and Mauritania, the study’s conclusions can be replicated and expanded to other countries on the continent.

An eventful first week at COP 27 in Sharm el Sheikh for our board member Hakima El Haite

Posted on 15 November 202215 November 2022 by the_bridge_tank

The first week of the COP 27 in Sharm El Sheikh saw the world gather in the Egyptian coastal city to exchange on the many pressing issues of the world’s environmental crisis. One of those leaders taking part in the discussions and the seeking out of concrete solutions to combat climate change in Sharm el Sheikh is The Bridge Tank’s board member, Hakima El Haite, President of Liberal International.

Through her frontline presence at COP 27, Hakima El Haite not only underlined the danger of putting climate action on the back burner in the current times of geopolitical and economic uncertainty, she took a strong stance in favour of climate justice.

During an event organised by The New York Times “On the Verge of Progress: Where Will COP 27 Take Us?” on November 8^th, with Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister of Scotland, and Laurence Tubiana, France’s Climate Change Ambassador and Special Representative for COP21 and founder of IDDRI, Hakima El Haite stressed the urgency of climate action and reaching net-zero emissions. She did so while pointing out the increase of global subsidies for fossil fuels and the rebound of CO2 emissions worldwide. The need for increased funding to fulfil the $100 billion pledge by the wealthiest nations, the goal of $40 billion dedicated to adaptation finance, and the importance of greening the financial sector were also addressed during this event.

The transition to cleaner energy sources and the potential offered by green hydrogen were additional topics on the agenda of this first week of COP 27. Hakima El Haite took part in the launch event of the “Africa Extraordinary Green Hydrogen Potential” study with the European Investment Bank (EIB), the International Solar Alliance, United Cities and Local Governments of Africa, and the Government of the Republic of Mauritania. The report “combines an analysis of investment opportunities with a roadmap of technical, economic, environmental and financial solutions to unlock commercial development” of green hydrogen in Africa, so EIB Vice-President Ambroise Fayolle.

Our board member Hakima El Haite’s commitment to climate justice came once again to the fore at COP 27, as she put special emphasis on the necessity of tackling the environmental crisis in those countries and regions which have been disproportionately affected by climate change or which are least prepared to face its effects.

Her continued efforts in favour of the African continent were also at the heart of her interventions at this year’s climate change conference. The continent, home to 17% of the world’s population and responsible for less than 4% of the world’s CO2 emissions, is facing the most dire effects of the unfolding environmental crisis.

Through her participation in the release of the Institute for Economics and Peace’s “Ecological Threat Report 2022,” Dr. El Haite called for concerted international efforts to effectively face the climate crisis and for greater solidarity and concrete actions on the side of developed countries to support developing countries. She especially emphasized the urgency of investing massively in adaptation and mitigation in Africa. According to the “Ecological Threat Report 2022,” two thirds of the hotspot countries facing catastrophic ecological threat, water stress, and food insecurity are found in sub-Saharan Africa.

Finally, Hakima El Haite used her presence at COP 27 to defend another key aspect of climate justice, namely the role and voices of women in the efforts to combat climate change. With the climate crisis affecting women to a greater extent than men, working to include and promote women’s voices has been a cause central to Dr. El Haite’s efforts in Sharm el Sheikh.

Hydrodiplomacy : International Rivers as Peace Enablers – experiences and solutions from river basin organizations

Posted on 25 October 202225 October 2022 by the_bridge_tank

Water has long been a resource taken for granted. As its flow and presence seemed endless, neighboring states sharing access to rivers and lakes often chose to approach water in a utilitarian and competing manner.

But as the deterioration of ecosystems and the effects of climate change increasingly became apparent on this resource thought to be immutable, the realization that water needed to be managed sustainably slowly took hold.

While the UN (Transboundary and International) Water Convention adopted in Helsinki in 1992 currently only gathers 47 countries, its acceptance by the global community ought to be accelerated. Additional to the Convention, and in the age of coalitions, is the need for a Blueprint for “Shared River Basins Peace” through the promotion of sustainable management, tools, and institutions for shared rivers, or, in other words, a renewed and enlarged practice of Hydro-Diplomacy.

Concerning international river basins management, rivalry over access to the resource is the basis of international law. However the very sustainability of the resource implies cooperation across actors, which is paradoxically often domestically implemented within countries that externally fight each other.

Water, and more specifically international rivers and their management should no longer be limited to the single dimension of the quantity of water needed by a country, but addressed in a more holistic way by taking into account the whole river basin in terms of territory, actors and activities from upstream to downstream – something that some river basin organizations are already doing well, a fact that is seldom showcased.

The Senegal River Development Organization (OMVS – Organisation de Mise en Valeur du Fleuve Sénégal), an international organization which has for decades worked towards the peace of river basins across Guinea, Mali, Mauritania, Senegal, offers as an apt illustration of hydrodiplomacy put in practice.

Read our full Policy Brief here.

On the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly, The Bridge Tank contributes to diplomatic, civil society and business events.

Posted on 30 September 202230 September 2022 by the_bridge_tank

After two years of global pandemic, the United Nations General Assembly resumed in September 2022. As it is traditionally the case, this very active week will see the gathering of heads of state and government in New York, as well as numerous events organized by the diplomatic, civil society and business communities. On this occasion, The Bridge Tank was present and contributed to these three exchange mechanisms.

Active with the diplomatic community, The Bridge Tank has taken part in a number of events.

As an observer member of Liberal International (LI), The Bridge Tank, represented by Dr. Joël Ruet, President, attended the official high-level event co-organized by LI and “The Alliance of Her” on the theme: Women’s political rights and leadership – the key to tackling the greatest global challenges of our time. The Alliance of Her is a platform dedicated to promoting women’s political leadership and equal representation in Europe, a round table that included our board member, Hakima El Haite, President of LI.

Ahead of this roundtable, Hakima El Haite presented the 2021 Liberal International Freedom Prize to Dr. Sima Samar, Former UN Rapporteur and former Minister of Women’s Affairs of Afghanistan. Throughout her career, Dr. Samar has consistently championed the cause of women and girls and promoted the inclusion of Afghan women.

Participants included: Sima Sami Bahous, Executive Director of UN Women, Olha Stefanishyna, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Ukraine, Alexander De Croo, Prime Minister, Kingdom of Belgium, Viktorija Čmilytė-Nielsen, Speaker of the Seimas (Parliament), Lithuania, Meryl L. Frank, American Diplomat and Board Member of the United States Holocaust Memorial and Juli Minoves, former President of LI.

The Bridge Tank also participated in a closed meeting organized by the Estonian Permanent Mission to the United Nations on the theme: “Crisis in Belarus: implications for regional and global security” around Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, leader of the democratic opposition Belarusian, who was able to exchange with various diplomatic representations at the United Nations. The Bridge Tank was alongside, among others, the Swedish, German, British, United States representations, the European Union to the United Nations and the Microsoft Foundation and the PEN Foundation for this meeting chaired by the Minister of Foreign Affairs Estonian foreigners.

Thanks to its network and its actions, The Bridge Tank allowed the meeting between our board member, Hakima El Haité, President of the Liberal International and Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, leader of the Belarusian democratic opposition.

With civil society, The Bridge Tank joined meetings in favor of the fight against climate change, in particular on the question of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), being one of the key subjects of this 77th General Assembly. United Nations. This year’s “SDG Moment” is an opportunity to refocus attention on the SDGs of the UN’s 2030 Agenda, a blueprint for a fairer future for people and the planet.

Joël Ruet particularly contributed his expertise during a lunch debate organized by Diplomatic Courier. These exchanges allowed reflection around the following questions: are we on the right track to achieve the SDGs by 2030? How has the pandemic accelerated or derailed solutions? How do our goals (individual and organizational) align with the SDGs? How to create extraordinary collaborations? Global Goals in Action 2022 will bring together leaders from the private sector and international organizations to leverage their experience, market access and resources to achieve the SDGs. Thus, the participants agreed to conclude on “the need for transformational change [of our societies] to make progress on the SDGs”.

In a continuation of the discussions on the SDGs, Joël Ruet took part in the annual Concordia 2022 Summit, which was, according to the organizers, the largest gathering on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly. It aims to bring together the world’s biggest players to spark dialogue, promote collaboration and collectively pave the way to a more equitable and sustainable future around the themes of: environmental sustainability; global trade, manufacturing and supply chains; human rights and social progress; and financial inclusion.

On these topics and around the Nobel Peace Prize, The Bridge Tank participated in a meeting organized by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

The Bridge Tank has also been involved in the business world, first of all by participating in the “Invest Africa” forum, where its President, Joël Ruet, was able to meet a number of investment actors in Africa, in particular in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Namibia – two countries in full transformation which deserve a very attentive scrutiny. He also attended a reception organized by Microscoft’s representation at the United Nations to discuss the evolution of the economic world.

Analysis – Where has the Chinese COP 15 disappeared ?

Posted on 22 September 202222 September 2022 by the_bridge_tank

By Joël RUET & Malaurie LE BAIL – After being half-postponed four times due to the pandemic, half-launched through a heads of states level online event on October 2021, the COP 15 on biodiversity should have finally happened started on April 25, 2022 in Kunming, China. Is is now being postponed to the end of 2022 in Montreal, Canada for logistical and sanitary reasons, while China will still hold the Presidency. With little media coverage throughout and only few academic and journalistic analyses, the COP 15 is the great absentee from the international news as ecosystems reach their limits. The responsibility lies with a host country not very involved: China.

China’s COP 15 missed a major diplomatic opportunity in visibility and in environmental themes advancement. China’s communication was blurred from the beginning with the half-postponing, half-keeping of the COP 15. The October 2021 virtual meeting largely saw the promotion of a “Kunming Consensus” that could only be really negotiated by March 2022 in Geneva. What became a “pre-COP” appeared only sparsely in the Western media. Infused with much of rhetoric, the “pre-COP” turned into an empty shell.

Was the opportunity just missed as China decided to focus on propagating Xi’s ideas on “ecological civilization”, a concept so far yet to be informed by tools and measures? Or is there a larger shift away from China? On this ground China’s quasi-absence from the COP 26 had already not gone unnoticed. It is one of several countries whose top leader did not attend in person, alongside Brazil, Russia, and Turkey. Instead, China was represented by special climate envoy Xie Zhenhua, touching briefly on the country’s continued commitments to cutting carbon without making any new declarations, alip service putting into question the legitimacy and dedication of the country in the global fight against climate change. The overall deadline for revised Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) has been pushed from the COP26 to the COP 27 largely due to China having not filled its contribution in an ambitious way, many observers agree.

Being host to a global conference has its share of reward and any hosting country has its publicity, western style, or propaganda, dirigiste style. However, with this low tone commitment of China on climate, doubts have arisen as to whether China, one of the world’s greatest emitters of C02 and plastic, will be capable of upholding its responsibilities as host country for the COP 15. China has yet to sign the Global Methane Pledge, a pledge launched by the United States and the European Union during COP26, along with 103 countries representing 70% of the global economy, to keep the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees within reach.

Glasgow observers, as they prepare for the COP 27 in Egypt, contend China continues to isolate itself further and further from the international sphere. The lack of information and transparency regarding the biodiversity COP 15 only reinforces what was said by the observers of the climate COP 26. Moreover, the COP 15 is the first major global conference within the United Nations system officially labeled under the concept of “ecological civilization”.

The European Union has been setting ambitious goals to reduce carbon emissions by 55% by 2030 and becoming carbon neutral by 2050. For Europe, both the COP 15 and the COP 26 have largely been seen as mere continuations from the IUCN World Conservation Congress, which took place in September 2021 in Marseille, France and culminated in the “Marseille Manifesto,” also referred to as a ‘roadmap’ to international negotiations, calling governments to commit to ambitious plans for the conservation of nature.

The COP on biodiversity lacks an equivalent of what the “Paris agreement” is to the COP on climate change. China had a role to play in supporting this event. As a sign of China’s self-centeredness, the communication, upstream and downstream of the Kunming COP event, is more than poor. The Chinese low profile has contributed to aggravate the lack of awareness and communication to the general public on biodiversity issues on the international stage.

In this international calendar, The Bridge Tank has positioned itself on the topic and has written a report. Read our further analysis here.

AUKUS – The Bridge Tank in Conversation with Frank Wisner

Posted on 8 July 20227 June 2023 by the_bridge_tank

Ambassador Frank Wisner, former USA under Secretary of Defense, puts AUKUS in context: a technological grouping of like-minded nations in front of China’s assertiveness, while remaining open to dialogue with China and to collaboration with Europe, India and others.

The discussion addressed recent tensions between France and AUKUS, geopolitical shifts since the launch of AUKUS, including nuclear preoccupations, and possible avenues for a larger technological cooperation between AUKUS and France, AUKUS and India-Japan.

This conversation was conducted following a webinar, co-hosted by The Bridge Tank and the Maritime Research Center.

Rewatch the conversation:

The Bridge Tank at Liberal International’s 75th anniversary congress in Sofia

Posted on 5 July 20221 June 2023 by the_bridge_tank

From June 30 to July 3, 2022, Liberal International held its 75th anniversary congress in Sofia, Bulgaria. Joel Ruet, President, The Bridge Tank, attended the congress, our think tank having been elected an observer member of Liberal International in 2021.

As President of Liberal International, our Board Member Hakima el Haité declared open this year’s congress. In her address to the delegates, Hakima el Haité pointed to the current times of challenges for democracy and the liberal order, freedom and equality. She however stressed the importance of LI’s efforts, with leaders and experts from all over the world fighting against the destruction of democracy, responding to the food crisis triggered by Russia’s war and working to protect the environment.

Over the following days, Russia’s attack on Ukraine was an ever-present issue, with Olga Stefanishyna, Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration joining the Congress remotely to address Russia’s manipulation and blackmail of the food crisis to put an end to the war in its own terms.

Another highlight of this year’s congress was a session on facts-based understanding of the human rights situation in Afghanistan with the participation of Dr Sima Samar, former Minister of Women’s Affairs of Afghanistan and 2022 recipient of Liberal International’ Prize For Freedom.

Joel Ruet also attended a session discussing security issues in Sub-Saharan Africa, with Gilbert Noel Ouédraogo, President, Africa Liberal Network highlighting that without securing peace in Africa and organising the continent through liberal principles in regional cooperation, migration crises would continue to be a challenge in the years to come.

As a non-partisan think tank and an observer member of LI, The Bridge Tank does not participate in the vote of resolutions. Our mission is to engage with political leaders to “bridge out” consensus where possible.