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Mission - Enhancing Global Connectivity
PoWER strives to create a pre-eminent network of autonomous collaborating centres in all regions of the developing world, for the research into and the dissemination of all aspects of integrated and sustainable management of water and environmental resources and services.
The Partnership will provide demand-responsive and duly accredited postgraduate education, research and capacity building services to individuals and organisations throughout the developing world. It will be characterised by a quality hallmark that ensures the integrity of its members and the quality of the services that they offer. PoWER, with its members in the developing countries will be linked to a complementary network of supporting UN Agencies with relevant professional and education mandates, and with partners in industrialised countries).
One of the major goals of the Partnership is to empower local and regional capacities in the developing world. The shaping of an appropriate technical information and communication infrastructure to reach that goal is part of the Partnership project.
Immediate Objectives
Building the Partnership: to establish, regulate and operate the global partnership for water education and research that will define and develop - with UNESCO-IHE partners - a system for the management and quality control of the services that will be jointly provided and will actively involve the alumni community of all the partners in the activities of the global network. UNESCO-IHE will be an integral component of the partnership, and as such will have to ensure that its own organisational processes are redesigned in alignment with its mission objectives. In particular it will pay close attention to processes of continuous learning and improvement.
Products: to implement joint activities such as staff exchange, formation of Communities of Practice, levelling the capacity of partners, so as to develop and deliver joint products: educational modules, research projects and facilities for Internet-based collaborative working and learning.
Tools: to set-up the ICT infrastructure and implement appropriate tools for the effective operation of the global network and for its collaborative working and learning activities at the global and regional level. In particular the following Communities of Practice will be facilitated: UNESCO-IHE and its collaborating regional partners, the Global Alumni Network, and two regional knowledge Networks: WaterNet and the Nile River Basin Network.
UNESCO-IHE's role is in the Partnership is:
· to assist and facilitate in making knowledge from the North available to partners and institutions in the South;
· to stimulate knowledge exchange between institutions in the South and with the North;
· to support local and regional institutions in developing high quality education for water and environmental sector professionals;
· to make available accredited educational components to local and regional partners within the framework of a collaborative or 'joint-venture' relationship with the aim of (1) making regional or local education of professionals attractive compared with 'overseas training', and (2) benchmarking the locally accredited education.
The initial financial resources that are made available by the Dutch Government amount Euro 4.5 million for the coming five years (2002-2006). National Governments together with the international donor agencies are invited to join this programme. PoWER will be an efficient and effective provider of education, long-life learning, research and capacity building services to developing countries.
As expressed by the Netherlands' Government, it is an honour to facilitate UNESCO and IHE with the realisation of this initiative. The Government of the Netherlands has, therefore, made substantial financial commitments to the creation of this Institute within UNESCO. The Netherlands Government recognises the Institute as one of the most experienced and competent organisations capable of, and committed to, sustaining the education, training and research components of its international programmes and services. This initiative offers UNESCO-IHE and its network associates a more prominent role in connecting world-wide knowledge networks, in particular within and between the developing countries.
The Institute envisages the layout of an effective system which can make these objectives operational whereby optimum use is made of the existing organisational framework.
The ultimate, shared mission of collaborating institutes and knowledge centres is to strengthen local institutions, water education delivery and water and environment sector performance, by means of:
· equalising access to knowledge between partners in North and South;
· stimulating and improving the transfer of knowledge from North to South through the transfer of educational programmes from the North to regional centres in the South (transfer of knowledge and means);
· improving the transfer of knowledge from South to North so that the educational programmes developed in partnership can be more effectively targeted at bringing about constructive changes in the water sector in the South;
· improving the quality of education provided by the knowledge institutions in the water and environment sector through bench-marking regional education institutions, and stimulating co-operation between partners in the South;
· providing life-long learning systems i.e. changing education towards training 'change agents' to bring about measurable change in their home countries and organisations (in the water and environmental sectors). Special attention will be given to the alumni community of UNESCO-IHE and its partners.
The Power Charter
The Signing of the Partnership for Water Education & Research (PoWER) Charter
17 Dignitaries of leading water and environment knowledge centres around the world signed the PoWER Charter on 21 November 2002 at the UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education.
With the ratification by the initial 17 partners of the Charter, the PoWER initiative will in the coming years build capacity in developing countries by delivering qualified professionals in the fields of integrated water resources management. This Partnership is a solid, action-oriented reply to the urgent appeals of the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) of the WSSD in Johannesburg. Water was placed high on the political agenda, in aiming to ensure environmental sustainability and halving the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water.
The 17 signatories of the PoWER Charter, 21 November 2002, Prinsekamer, UNESCO-IHE, Delft, The Netherlands
With the signing of this Charter, 17 Partners are eligible to carry the name "Collaborative Centre of UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education". The signing was carried out by the following individuals representing each PoWER Partner (see photo):
· Dr. Munzer Barakat, Birzeit University , Palestinian Authority
· Mr. Guo Jichao, Hohai University , China PR
· Mr. C Vijayakumar, Human Settlement Management Institute , HUDCO, India
· Dr. Moustafa Gaweesh, Hydraulics Research Institute , Egypt
· Dr. Jorge Garcia, Instituto Technologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey , Mexico
· Prof. Dr. Kwesi Andam, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology , Ghana
· Dr. P.M. Kasoma, Makerere University/Institute for Environment and Natural Resources , Uganda
· Prof. Liu Heng, Nanjing Hydraulic Research Institute , China PR
· Mr. Savi Gharavi, Regional Centre for Urban Water Management , Iran
· Prof. Dr. A. Babaqi, Sana'a University , Yemen
· Prof. Dr. H.Y. Lee, Taiwan International Institute for Water Education , Chinese Taipei
· Ir. Maarten Blokland, UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education , The Netherlands
· Dr. Alberto Ferral, Universidad Blas Pascal , Argentina
· Prof. Oscar Rojas Renteria, Universidad del Valle , Colombia
· Ir. Robertus W. Triweko, Universitas Katolik Parahyangan , Indonesia
· Prof. Dr. A. Wright, University of Zimbabwe/Department of Civil Engineering
· Prof. Dr. A. Wright, WaterNet , Zimbabwe
Further information: www.ihe.nl
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