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The Water Stewardship Initiative in Maharashtra, India, employs community-led governance to combat water scarcity and falling groundwater levels. By establishing Village Water Management Teams and using tools like Water Health Charts and Water Budgets, the initiative has improved the water status of villages, increased water harvesting by 61.44 billion litres between 2016 and 2017, and promoted water-saving techniques that saved 3.24 billion litres. The model emphasizes stakeholder engagement, the formulation of local water-use rules, and the treatment of water as a common good through Group Micro-Irrigation to enhance climate change adaptation.

The document highlights the critical need for climate-resilient investment in the Caribbean water sector to mitigate high economic losses from hazards like hurricanes and droughts. Between 2010 and 2012, USD 8.3 billion in ODA was disbursed to the Caribbean, with USD 172 million allocated to the water sector; of this, only USD 12 million was tagged as climate change relevant. In contrast, global climate funds provided USD 14 million to the water sector during the same period, showing a stronger focus on strategy development and technical studies compared to the infrastructure focus of traditional ODA. The brief identifies five key global climate funds that disbursed a total of USD 44 million to the Caribbean, with 32% targeted at water. It recommends that water sector planners use online platforms like Climate Finance Options to identify funding and suggests matching specialist climate finance with traditional sources to leverage larger investments.

The report identifies critical failures in South African water governance and provides recommendations for civil society to intervene and improve the management of water resources.

The report critiques the role of international financial institutions and multinational corporations in promoting water privatization, highlighting resulting price hikes and environmental degradation. It documents specific cases of 'water wars' and corporate lawsuits in Bolivia, pollution in Indonesia and Peru, and the ecological impact of dams in France and Norway, while proposing community-led, sustainable alternatives.

The document introduces 'metacoupling' as a research lens to understand the interdependence of social-ecological systems (SES) across local (intracoupling), adjacent (pericoupling), and distant (telecoupling) scales. By integrating an equity lens—focusing on distributional, procedural, and recognitional dimensions—the framework reveals how global flows of resources and capital influence local inequities. Case studies in South Africa and Namibia illustrate that international market demands and certification standards often marginalize small-scale producers and riverine communities, while power imbalances between local actors and multinational entities constrain equitable resource access.

The report argues that climate change adaptation in the Tropical Andes requires a shift from fragmented, traditional science to a holistic, interdisciplinary approach that integrates natural and social sciences with traditional knowledge. It identifies key barriers, such as the disconnect between scientists and policymakers, fragmented information, and a lack of institutional support for interdisciplinary work. The document highlights national examples from Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru, emphasizing the need for government-led funding strategies that prioritize transdisciplinary research to ensure the sustainability of natural resources and human well-being.

The document outlines the impacts of anthropogenic climate change on water security across the Americas, highlighting increased variability in the water cycle, glacier loss in the Andes, and water scarcity in North America. It emphasizes that current adaptation practices are becoming insufficient and advocates for equitable, inclusive, and transformational policies that integrate indigenous knowledge and intersectoral coordination to reduce future risks.

The document examines the diverse impacts of climate change in Latin America and the Caribbean, highlighting vulnerabilities in rural communities, women, education, and public health. It discusses the role of ocean warming in collapsing fisheries, the link between deforestation and zoonotic diseases, and the necessity of shifting from technocratic to participatory water governance. The report emphasizes the 'Anthropocene' as a geological era driven by human activity and argues for a transdisciplinary approach to science that integrates local and indigenous knowledge to create effective public policies.

The Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) is an intergovernmental organization serving 19 member states in the Americas. It focuses on transdisciplinary research and the science-policy interface to address global change. Key initiatives include the health-climate-environment nexus, Amazon and tropical forest research via the Belmont Forum, and the Science, Technology and Policy (STeP) fellows program.

The Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) is an intergovernmental organization serving 19 member states in the Americas. It focuses on transdisciplinary research and the science-policy interface to develop evidence-based solutions for global change. Key initiatives include the health-climate-environment nexus, the Belmont Forum's global funding call for the Amazon and tropical forests, and the Science, Technology and Policy (STeP) fellows program for early-career researchers.

The GovernAgua project analyzed six river basins in Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay to identify how to improve water governance in the face of complex crises. Findings indicate that while water crises often lead to improved biophysical monitoring, responses remain predominantly reactive. The project advocates for a shift toward anticipatory governance, interdisciplinary practices, and stronger science-policy-society dialogue to address the fragmented management between environmental protection and agricultural productivity.

The document examines the multifaceted impacts of climate change in Latin America and the Caribbean, focusing on vulnerable populations, ecosystem degradation, and the necessity of a transdisciplinary approach to science. Key findings highlight the disproportionate burden on rural women, the role of ocean warming in destroying artisanal fisheries, the link between habitat loss and emerging zoonotic diseases, and the increasing frequency of climate-driven migration. It specifically analyzes the 'vicious cycle' of fires in the Amazon and the challenges of water governance in the Paraná Basin. The report argues that traditional top-down scientific models often exclude the voices of those most affected, proposing a 'co-production' of knowledge between scientists and local communities to create more effective and just adaptation strategies.

The GovernAgua project analyzed six watersheds in Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay to understand the drivers of water crises and the effectiveness of basin committees. Findings indicate that while crises often improve biophysical monitoring, responses remain largely reactive. The project advocates for inter-institutional cooperation, transdisciplinary practices, and stronger science-policy-society dialogue to build anticipatory governance capacities.

The document argues that a just transition in South Africa must move beyond simple decarbonization to address structural inequalities rooted in the minerals-energy complex (MEC). It proposes a 'transformative resilience' framework based on three pillars: a green decent work agenda, expanded social protection (such as a universal basic income guarantee), and radical land reform. The essays detail specific vulnerabilities, including the marginalization of women in ecosystem-based adaptation, the mental health burdens of climate change on Black communities, and the precariousness of informal waste pickers. Sectoral analyses emphasize the need for inclusive food systems, urban drought resilience in cities like Cape Town, and the integration of renewable energy to support agricultural productivity and rural development.

The report examines the impact of the Turkey-North Cyprus water pipeline, an innovative project pumping water from the Taurus Mountains to North Cyprus, within the context of increasing water scarcity in the Eastern Mediterranean. It highlights a systemic failure in water governance in North Cyprus, characterized by short-term political tactics, lack of coordination, and unsustainable groundwater extraction leading to salinisation. While the pipeline provides a significant new resource, the authors argue that without comprehensive reform—including the creation of an independent regulatory board, better data collection, and bi-communal cooperation—the project may not ensure long-term climate resilience. The report suggests adopting OECD principles of water governance to improve effectiveness, efficiency, and trust.

Work Package 1 (WP1) of the CADWAGO project aims to assess the impact of stakeholder perceptions of ecosystems on water governance in the context of climate change. Using 10 international case studies, researchers will apply four distinct interpretations of resilience—engineering, ecological, social-ecological, and epistemic—to analyze how water resource systems are perceived and governed. The methodology involves qualitative content analysis of policy and scientific documents, followed by pattern matching across cases and member check interviews. The findings are intended to identify social barriers and opportunities for adaptive responses to climate change and inform the analytical frameworks of other project work packages.

The Master Plan for the Pampa Huari River Basin (PDC-PH) provides a comprehensive strategy to address water scarcity, pollution from mining and urban waste, and land degradation in a semi-arid region of Potosí, Bolivia. Developed under the Bolivia WATCH program using a Robust Decision Making (RDM) framework, the plan integrates water supply (WASH) with basin-wide hydrology. Key findings highlight critical water quality issues, with several rivers classified as 'Class E' (unsuitable for human consumption) due to mining and urban sewage. The plan prioritizes three micro-basins—Kari Kari, Santa Lucia, and Villacollo—for environmental restoration and proposes five strategic lines focusing on ecosystem protection, sustainable water and sanitation, efficient agricultural irrigation, mining impact mitigation, and inter-institutional governance.

Work Package 2 (WP2) of the CADWAGO project investigates how formal and informal institutional arrangements mediate the relationship between society and water resources under the pressure of climate change. Using a social institutions framework, the research employs two primary analytical tools: the context-structure-process-outcomes (CSPO) framework to analyse organisational functioning and the "five capitals" approach (human, social, natural, physical, and financial) to evaluate adaptive capacity. The study utilizes ten international case studies, including specific analyses of flooding in the Baltic Sea Region and along the south-east Queensland coast, to identify governance practices that enable systemic transformation and water security. Led by the University of the Sunshine Coast with partners from Griffith University, the University of Tasmania, and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the work involves stakeholder interviews and literature synthesis to provide policy-makers with insights into climate change adaptation regimes.

The document describes a research framework for Work Package 3 of the CADWAGO project, focusing on 'systemic governance' of water catchments. It proposes viewing water catchments as 'social-biophysical systems' where human social systems and biophysical systems are 'structurally coupled' and co-evolve. The research aims to move away from linear models of knowledge transfer toward models of learning and adaptation, specifically investigating four key areas: history, facilitation, stake-holding, and reflexivity. The project utilizes systems theory and the metaphor of a 'helmsperson' to understand how governance can be adaptive in response to uncertainty and feedback.

Work Package 4 (WP4) of the CADWAGO project aims to analyze European water governance by synthesizing insights from other work packages and case studies. Using a theoretical lens of 'governance learning' and the science-policy interface, WP4 seeks to identify 'windows of opportunity' for systemic and adaptive water governance. The methodology involves iterative learning, transdisciplinary approaches, and three scheduled governance learning events in Sweden (June 2013), with the Open University (June 2014), and the University of Sicilie (June 2015) to facilitate dialogue between researchers and stakeholders.