Progress report for
Scaling-up Water as Leverage Globally for worldwide urban climate resilience
Achievement at a glance
The “Water as Leverage” program was initiated by the Netherlands government to develop initiatives in cities that deliver transformative and inclusive projects. The WaL approach is a proven design-led practice for catalyzing urban water resilience. It focuses on the early stages of project development, acknowledges the interconnectedness of water, by moving beyond single project development to drive transformative change, and builds on practical experiences in many cities. Projects emerging from WaL initiatives are innovative, inclusive, bankable and cross-cut sectoral, disciplinary and administrative boundaries impacting on all SDGs.At the UN 2023 Water conference, as part of the Water Action Agenda, the ambition to scale up Water as Leverage globally was announced by the Dutch Minister of Infrastructure and Water Management, Mark Harbers. Three pathways are being developed to realise the scaling ambition.
At UNFCCC COP29, UN-Habitat was welcomed as additional Water Action Agenda Commitment Partner for Scaling-up Water as Leverage Globally for worldwide urban climate resilience.
WaL city initiatives
The first initiative ‘Water as Leverage for Resilient Cities Asia’, started in 2018 materialized in over two dozen transformative projects that catalyze urban resilience using water as a lever for sustainable development and climate change action. Now, Water as Leverage (WaL) initiatives are ongoing in the cities of Cartagena (Colombia), Harlingen (Netherlands), Bangkok (Thailand), Nakuru (Kenya) and Prayagraj (India). Through alliances with international financial institutions, resilience experts, academia, cities, governments and local and international networks, new Water as Leverage initiatives will be launched in cities to answer to the urgent global need for urban water resilience or scaled up like WaL in Indonesia.
WaL Factory
Together with UN-Habitat, the WaL Factory will be implemented through its WaL global programme. It will provide process and technical guidance to WaL partners, enabling them to drive their own WaL initiatives in cities. It will also support in mobilizing funding and finance for the programme and initiatives, integrate water into global frameworks as well as national and local plans to leverage those for enhanced local action, and provide opportunities (such as the City Champion Challenge) to implement WaL initiatives in urban landscapes across different countries.
WaL Academy
The WaL Academy is a platform to nurture, enrich, and disseminate the Water as Leverage approach and culture across geographies, professional curricula, civil society and policy arenas. It inspires a range of stakeholders, decision-makers, water-, adaptation and infrastructure practitioners, as well as the academic arena of students, alumni, professionals to exchange knowledge, experiences and new ideas, exploring how the WaL approach can be applied in their landscapes. With the National Mission Clean Ganga (Namami Gange) and National Institute for Urban Affairs (NIUA), both in India, work is being done to integrate WaL Principles from the WaL Guidance into the Urban River Management Plan framework and its application in 60 cities.
As an integrated approach, the Academy and the Factory work in close collaboration to provide knowledge and technical support to the Initiatives. The three pathways are designed to learn from each other.
Challenges faced in implementation
The main challenges are connected to the three transitions Water as Leverage aims to achieve:I. Breaking through the lock-in. Worldwide there is still not enough money allocated nor accounted for funding the pre project-preparation phase. This phase, including research, inclusive collaboration, coalition building, sparking the enabling environment, capacity building, design and innovation, demands public-private collaboration, in a ‘challenge’ context (pressure-cooker). This unlocks the millions to invest billions wisely.
II. breaking through the fragmentation in the project development process. We aim for active involvement of all stakeholders – local communities, public, private and financial sectors – from the start in infrastructural project development;
III. breaking away from the narrow focus on projects. We need to broaden the scope to both projects ánd process, and the necessary enabling environment to create transformative change. It is about people, process and projects for sustainable impact.
To achieve these transitions and to be able to implement WaL takes time and resources.
Next Steps
The expected impact that the Netherlands government and partners committed to deliver by 2030, through implementing, upscaling and replicating the Water as Leverage approach, will be:- An operational Water as Leverage Factory, in which governments (cities, regional and national), UN agencies, International Financial Institutions, foundations, NGO’s/CSO’s and research, education and knowledge institutes collaborate to develop and implement Water as Leverage initiatives, delivering transformative climate adaptation and urban water resilience strategies, programs and projects.
- The strengthened capacity of hundreds and thousands of water practitioners and change makers- urban and rural - for inclusive, transformative climate adaptation and urban water resilience capacity through a Water as Leverage Academy in which students, alumni, professionals and decisionmakers apply the Water as Leverage approach to real-life cases, contributing to the identification of new initiatives.
- An increased number of new initiatives, as well as the scaling up of successful ones, that will be supported by the Factory and the Academy.
To be able to deliver on this expected impact, the following next steps will have to be taken:
- Implement the WaL global programme and bring partners on board;
- Develop the WaL Academy so that more partners/organisations/stakeholders will be able to apply/use the water as leverage approach in their own city. The WaL guidance in which the principles of WaL, the project cycles and deep dives are mentioned, are the foundation for this.
- Establish the Factory to ensure the mechanisms to provide technical support for implementing and scaling up initiatives are in place. Additionally, create an institutionalised structure that actively participates in discussions on integrating urban water resilience into global and national policy frameworks and plans.
- Secure multi-annual funding for the global WaL programme through targeted outreach to donors, especially during upcoming global events – WUF12 and COP29, as well as the development of concept notes for identified funding opportunities.
Beneficiaries
The ambition is to scale Water as Leverage globally towards advancing urban water resilience. Beneficiaries are people in cities that benefit from the initiatives undertaken. Current direct beneficiaries are urban dwellers and stakeholders in the cities of Khulna, Semarang, Chennai, Cartagena, Nakuru, Bangkok, Harlingen, Prayagraj. On the other hand, the national and subnational governments of the countries where initiatives are implemented will benefit from the programme. They will receive support to ensure that their policies, strategies, and plans advance urban water resilience in their territories. Additionally, these governments will gain access to increased funding for the pre-project preparation phase, enabling cities and local initiatives to secure financial support from funding institutions. In addition, WaL inspires beyond the direct city initiatives through the Academy targeting at a variety of professionals and institutions, co-creating and exploring ways to advance urban resilience through connecting with ongoing processes.
Actions
To execute the city initiatives in a ‘learning by doing’ way to continuously be able to improve the process.Make sure that the lessons learned from the city initiatives feed back into the WaL Academy and Factory, and the WaL global programme and vice versa. 3 strong components that feed into each other and together increase the impact.
Key milestones for the Academy include: the release of the Water as Leverage guidance in autumn 2024, which introduces the WaL framework featuring eight core principles and six project development stages; the Water as Leverage Bangkok initiative, which pioneers innovations in urban water resilience and applies the WaL framework; co-developing urban river management plans for India’s Ganges Basin; increase the visibility of WaL and global community through the WaL City Champion Challenge; promote watering the NDCs and NAPs through knowledge exchange at COP29 in Baku and hosting innovation labs through our global network at the World Water Forum in Bali and the World Urban Forum in Cairo.