Delft, The Netherlands, 26 Sep 06 - 28 Sep 06
First announcement and call for papers

IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre and UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education are organising an international Symposium Sustainable Water Supply and Sanitation: Strengthening Capacity for Local Governance. This symposium will take place from Tuesday 26 September until Thursday 28 September in Delft, the Netherlands.

The symposium aims to provide a platform for sharing experiences in capacity development for improved local governance. Participants will identify key challenges and actions to establish an agenda for strengthening local governance for sustainable water supply and sanitation services. By ‘governance’ in this context we mean the total process of overseeing, guiding and shaping services and their interaction with communities, rather than simply the management responsibilities of a single organisation.

Why?

Decentralisation has shifted roles and responsibilities from national government to local government and other intermediate level bodies. Many of the actors who have emerged at this level struggle with their new responsibilities and with roles for which they are not fully equipped in terms of financial resources, knowledge, methodologies, tools and experience.

Stakeholders

A wide range of local level stakeholders, including actors from the public and private sectors and from civil society are involved in efforts to achieve sustainable water and sanitation services. They include local government bodies (at district or municipal level); decentralised ministry offices; private consultants and contractors; local NGOs; associations of municipalities; associations of water users (water committees); private water service providers; training institutions; professional associations and others.

Institutions at the intermediate level

The capacity of these actors and coordination between them is critical to ensuring that national policies and plans are based on realities within communities and translate into sustainable services for end users. B institutions at this intermediate level are essential to achieving good governance and ultimately to achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in a sustainable way. The task is to strengthen these intermediate actors to perform their roles effectively.

For whom?

This symposium aims to bring together representatives of associations of municipalities, of water boards and water user committees and NGOs as well as practitioners and researchers who are interested in or could bring in knowledge and experience in this area.

We also would like to welcome participants from outside the WASH sector with experience in capacity development at the intermediate level, providing new and useful insights for the sector.

Participants should cover all their costs. Please consult www.irc.nl/symposium/capacitydevelopment for a registration form and for regular updates on the organisation of the symposium.

Submission of papers

Participants are invited to submit abstracts for papers on specific topics, such as:

• Practical experiences with strengthening capacity in projects and programmes, relevant to local governance
• Examples of capacity development with proven impact
• Models and frameworks for effective capacity development
• Documentation and dissemination of capacity development processes

Deadline for abstracts: 1 Apr 2006

Abstracts should be no longer than 250 words, and be submitted before 1 April 2006 by e-mail to symposium@irc.nl. Based on the quality and relevance of the abstracts, a maximum of 20 persons will be invited to prepare a full paper for the symposium.

Please provide with your abstract, the name, title, affiliation, full mailing address, e-mail address, phone and fax numbers of the main contact and the presenting author.

Authors of papers accepted for inclusion in the programme will be notified by 1 June 2006 and will be invited to submit a full paper before 1 August 2006. Papers will be peer reviewed by subject specialists. Authors will then be asked to submit a final version addressing the reviewers’ comments before 15 August. Final versions will be published in the symposium booklet.