Probal Saha and Nureen faiza Anisha, C3ER, BRAC University participated in the “Dhaka Water Conference in Bangladesh” from 29-30 July 2017. The conference started with the presence of Delta Coalition and High Level Panel on Water (HLPW) Sherpa. He attended the four technical sessions on safe water, sanitation, water quality and water management in the conference. The 2-day long conference inaugurated on 29 July 2017 at the Pan Pacific Sonargaon, Dhaka organized by theLocal Government Division (LGD) and Department of Public Health Engineering (DPHE). The theme for this conference is “Water Sustains Development,” which is based on Sustainable Development Goal-6. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the coalition's ministerial conference at Sonargaon Hotel.
A total of 82 representatives, including ministers and state ministers, from 27 countries would participate in the conference. The 12 members of the Delta Coalition Bangladesh, Colombia, Egypt, France, Indonesia, Japan, Mozambique, Myanmar, the Netherlands, the Philippines, South Korea and Vietnam also attended the conference. The policymakers of the platform came up with 20 decisions as mentioned in the “Delta Coalition Dhaka Declaration” adopted at Dhaka Water Conference 2017. Delta Coalition members have decided to introduce some programs to stop ongoing migration and displacement of coastal people. They have also agreed to actively address the situation emanating from the permanent loss of cultivable land and human habitats owing to coastal soil erosion, sea level rise and coastal flooding, land subsidence due to over extraction of underground water. The Delta Coalition is the world's first international coalition of governments that have formed a partnership to deal with coastal flooding, wetland loss, shoreline retreat and loss of infrastructure to make the deltas more resilient. The coalition agreed on stepping up efforts to mobilize funding from private sector, bilateral development partners, and international financing institutions and funds for inclusive and sustainable development and management of the deltas. The member states also agreed to forge cooperation among them to deal with deltaic water governance issues at sub-regional, regional, multilateral and international levels. They decided to pursue integrated development and sustainable delta management and cross-border cooperation for basin wise management of the trans-boundary/international rivers and initiate/continue discussions at regional, sub-regional and international levels despite having divergent pursuits and realities of various countries.