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With public participation seen as key to long-term results, IWMI’s ReWater MENA project is working with local partners to build skills and launch participatory processes. The SIDA funded- project in Lebanon recently facilitated a three-day training on «Public Participation» at the Lebanese Agricultural Research Institute (LARI), from 27 to 29 May 2019. The facilitators, LISODE, are a French enterprise that guides the participatory processes in the project and ensures all project’s national and local activities are being implemented in a participatory way. Processes are aimed at involving and engaging all stakeholders in research and decision-making steps, starting from the national institutions to the end-users.

The ReWater MENA project team, accompanied by representatives from Lisode, conducted a field visit to a water and wastewater treatment plant in Matrouh on May 22, 2019. Matrouh is a coastal governorate located 440 kilometers northwest of Cairo, overlooking the Mediterranean Sea.

On March 27, 2019, IWMI’s ReWater MENA Project team, accompanied by colleagues from the Royal Scientific Society (RSS), made field visits in the Jordan Valley to assess potential for the development of water reuse models. The visit began in the middle Jordan Valley (Al Aghwar Al Wosta) in Dir Ghalla, where mostly treated wastewater from the Al Samra treatment plant is used. The main objective was to identify agricultural areas that have been irrigated with treated wastewater for 20 years, 10 years and 5 years. The project will study the long-term effect of using treated wastewater in these areas, compared to another area that has the same climate and agronomic conditions but is irrigated with freshwater.

The ReWater MENA project held its first National Learning Alliance (NLA) meeting in Jordan on 17 July 2019.  The aim of the meeting was to introduce the ReWater MENA project from a regional perspective to key stakeholders. Representatives from government, academia and non-governmental organizations participated. The program included an overview of the ReWater MENA project in the Middle East and North Africa by Dr. Gihan Bayoumi, Regional Project Manager. Implemented in Lebanon, Egypt and Jordan, the project tackles Goal 6 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).  Dr. Bayoumi, stressed that water is a scarce resource and that sustainable strategies for safe reuse of water must be implemented.

Women and girls make up half of the targeted communities’ populations, yet the water reuse issue is often silent toward the gendered needs, interests, and roles in local communities in how it is planned, implemented, and managed.