Background
Background
The high-level 2026 United Nations Water Conference to Accelerate the Implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 6: Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all will be held in the United Arab Emirates from 2–4 December 2026, co-hosted by Senegal and the United Arab Emirates.
The 2026 UN Water Conference will be comprised of plenary sessions and six interactive dialogues (A/RES/78/327). The Conference secretariat, UN-DESA, will prepare a background note on potential themes of the interactive dialogues, based on the inputs of Member States, the UN system, and a wide range of other stakeholders.
For more background information on the Conference, please see: https://sdgs.un.org/conferences/water2026.
Multi-Stakeholder Informative Webinar on the 2026 UN Water Conference
On 18 March, UNDESA organized a Multi-Stakeholder Informative Webinar to share updated information about the 2026 UN Water Conference with all stakeholders, and to offer an opportunity to build momentum towards the Conference preparations. The Ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to the UN and the Deputy Ambassador of the Republic of Senegal to the UN, as co-hosts of the Conference, shared their vision for the Conference. Ms. Retno L.P. Marsudi, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy on Water, delivered a video message with a strong call to action for SDG6. The webinar also featured a presentation on stakeholder engagement opportunities, including on awareness-raising and creating space. Participants were informed about the open call for inputs to the 2026 UN Water Conference Global Online Stakeholder Consultation on themes for the Interactive Dialogues, which will remain open until 11 April 2025. A total of 1007 people registered to join the webinar, 862 joined live and it was also livestreamed through the DESA Sustainable Development YouTube. Participants engaged in the discussion by responding to interactive polls throughout the webinar, as shown below.
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Announcements
The latest Concept note is now available under the "documentation" section.
