Water Scarcity versus Sustainability: How to Get the Balance Right

Chronic under-investment in the water sector, climate impacts and changing populations. All common challenges across EBRD’s regions of operations, but even more so in the SEMED region where acute water scarcity magnifies the need for a sustainable approach to water management. The private sector plays its part in building seawater desalination plants, but these need renewable energy solutions and environmentally sensitive designs to ensure they do no additional harm. An integrated approach also requires attention on reducing water losses from ageing infrastructure and reusing water that is, otherwise, wasted to better safeguard existing water resources. The entire water cycle should be re-examined, including wastewater treatment and its by-products, to promote a more circular economy. Digitalisation and innovation must also feature in future water systems to deliver greater system reliability.

This session will combine local and international speakers from the public and private sectors to provide insights into the challenges and potential solutions to address this critical issue of water scarcity.

Participants:

Dr. Rania Al-Mashat – Minister of International Cooperation, Government of Egypt
Nizar Baraka – Minister of Equipment and Water, Kingdom of Morocco
Nandita Parshad – Introduction & Welcome, Managing Director, Sustainable Infrastructure Group, EBRD
Sue Barrett (Moderator) – Director, Head of Infrastructure, Turkey, Middle East & Africa, EBRD
Suntharesan Padmanathan – Chief Executive Officer & Vice-Chairman, ACWA Power
Walid Madwar – General Manager, Vice President, Metito

Thierry Déau – Founding Partner, CEO, Meridiam

We will be using Slido for some of our events to help facilitate Q&A, collect your questions in advance and hear your feedback via live polls.
Please go to www.slido.com and enter 917000

French Simultaneous Interpretation is available for this event through the Interactio app.
View the linked instructions for details on how to access it:
www.ebrd.com/documents/comms-and-bis/interaction.pdf
Event code: AM2022