Both ENDS
By now, TTIP, the new EU-US free trade agreement, has become a hot topic in the Netherlands too. There has been heavy protest against this trade deal from civil society organisations, scientists, lawyers and civilians, who all have set off a ‘TTIP-alarm’. How much truth is there in their concerns about TTIP? What are the implications of TTIP for the Netherlands? If you are curious to find out the answers to these questions, then come to ‘The Big TTIP Debate: The debate about the free trade agreement between the EU and US’ on Friday evening April 17th. Several speakers will discuss with each other and with the audience about the above (and many more) questions.
Our West-African partners in Integral Water Resource Management are rapidly taking steps forward. In Lomé (Togo) they have founded their own regional headquarters. The proud name of the center is ‘AfriwaterCoP’ ( Community of Practice). They strive to bring together stakeholders such as farmers, fishermen, companies and authorities for fair and sustainable use of river water. Slowly but surely they also convince more and more government officials that all these stakeholders should be able to think along and take part in the decision process. This should be adopted in rules and regulations of regional and national law in the concerning provinces and states.
Signed by ministers of Togo and Benin, the transboundary Mono River will now have an institutional structure to discuss the management of this basin: the Mono River Basin Authority (MBA). Based on our Negotiated Approach, our partner JVE has from the start successfully engaged in the set up of this authority, advocating for the inclusion of all stakeholders in the future decision-making processes of the MBA.
We welcome Dickens Kamugisha (AFIEGO), Sena Alouka (JVE Togo), Christian Hounkannou (JVE Benin), Ken Kinney (The Development Institute), Robert Kugonza (NAPE), Serah Munguti (Nature Kenya), Halinishi Yusuf (ELCI) and Abby Onencan (Nile Basin Discourse). They have all been working on participatory watermanagement in the countries they come from, and we've invited them to come to the Netherlands to see how they can join forces.
There have been so many tributes from so many people, that anything I write seems insignificant. After all, I can’t say I knew him or ever met him, and I don’t have a memorable “Mandela and Me” moment to share. But like me, there are millions of ordinary people in this country and all around the world, who never met him, yet could not help being touched in some profound way by his extraordinary life.
Friday 20 November 2009 - 17h30 - 19h30 - Het Nutshuis - The Hague.
A new global climate treaty, which aims to counteract further global warming, is set for December. The European Union is said to have great ambitions for this climate summit in Copenhagen. However EU member states, such as the Netherlands, annually invest billions of euros through the European Investment Bank (EIB) in environmentally unfriendly industries, like oil, gas and mining, in developing countries. How can the Netherlands achieve its sustainable goals and incorporate climate considerations into its investment decisions?
