Report of Focused Learning Session of 02 August 2007 on SAP Implementation

Social Dynamics and attendance in the session

Between 20 to 30 participants attended the session in the auditorium 2.

The Panel was composed of one facilitator, and 5 representatives of three projects namely Danube, Medu and Mekong.

The session started with an introduction of objectives and expected outcome and results of the session i.e. to discuss key successful innovations in SAP implementation building on innovations presented by the above mentioned three projects with a view to adapt them to other context and projects and identify key future learning needs to be addressed by IW:LEARN. Hence each presentation was meant to focus on presenting (1) the innovative issues, and (2) their potential for replications.

It was intended to allow 10 minutes per presentation followed by a 5 minutes for questions strictly related to the presentations, allowing for a further 40 minutes of debate and discussion prior to wrapping up for the last 15 minutes. The amphitheatre configuration of the auditorium 2 however proved to be anti-conducive to holding an open and frank discussion. Participants came in late, presentations with almost 2 speakers each turned out to be lengthy and participants wanting more time than just 5 minutes for targeted questions. Thus, the time allocated for real debate kept shrinking. Participants seemed motivated though as a constructive and productive debate lasted until almost 13:00.

Issues discussed

The three projects were at different stage of implementation with the Danube having had 15 years of GEF support in developing the SAP and implementing it, with the Mediterranean concluding its PDF-B and ready for implementing its comprehensive SAP through a partnership system and the Mekong trying to reconcile all planning efforts in the lower basin.

Overall, apart from the exit strategy of the Danube which was only briefly mentioned, the issues presented turned out to be successful practices rather than innovations. Further, those successful practices did not seem to be unique to the SAP implementation process but were very common to many of the practices set in place during the planning phase—SAP formulation.

The issues presented and discussed could be clustered as follows.

1. Anchoring of projects into national and regional policies and cooperation mechanism is crucial.

2. Building upon existing policies and cooperation mechanism is key to ownership.

3. Fostering cooperation amongst riparian countries when difficult can prove successful if one starts it through specific technical solutions e.g. (1) pilot projects to validate policy concepts as in the Danube, (2) Tariff reforms as in the Danube or (3) joint water Quality guidelines as in the Mekong.

4. A sound Communication and outreach strategy for SAP implementation including replication strategies, stakeholder dialogue mechanisms thru’ traditional mechanisms, inter-ministerial committees etc is of paramount importance for building ownership and ensuring SAP implementation

5. Securing funding for SAP implementation thu' partnerships, sound financial strategies including various fiscalization mechanisms was considered as a critical issue to be thought off soon rather than late if one wants to secure an adequate level of funding for implementing its SAP.

6. Finally GEF was” congratulated” for its generous support spread over a good number of years allowing the necessary reforms for SAP implementation to be engendered.

Future learning needs.

To be able to benefit more in depth from one another experience, project twinning including project inter exchanges was recommended. Both the Amazon and Plata projects expressed strong interest in interacting with the Danube.

In response to a very interesting but unfortunately too short discussion on the value added of GEF support in SAP formulation and implementation, it turned out that most of the constituencies were not defining issues evenly and had difficulties framing the GEF SAP formulation key ingredients and modalities. It was thus suggested that the IW:LEARN SAP formulation training material currently considered as inadequate be revised and appropriate modalities designed for training the project constituencies.

Finally, it was recommended that SGP national Coordinators be involved into the SAP formulation processes in their respective basins or regions, to ensure proper synergies between the SGP programme which is a handy mechanism to complement SAP implementation. By doing so, SGP national coordinators would be made aware of the issues covered under the SAPs thus ensuring better complementarity and support from the SGP to the SAPs.

The meeting concluded at 12:55.

Converted with Word to HTML.