Egypt's Minister of Irrigation and Water Resources Hani Sewilam said the UN 2023 Water Conference represents a "critical juncture" not only for the UN Water Action Decade, but also for the Water Action Agenda.

At the global level, some progress has been made towards achieving the goals of the Water Decade, however, much remains to be done, particularly with water-related risks and disasters that have become more common over the past decade, the minister said.

He went on to say that there is an urgent need to take into account the strong links between water, human rights, health, peace and security.

This came during an interactive dialogue, titled "Water Action Decade: Accelerating the implementation of the objectives of the Decade, including through the UN Secretary-General's Action Plan" as part of the activities of the UN 2023 Water Conference.

To address these challenges, Egypt has successfully sought to put water at the heart of climate action after many years of futile attempts by the water community to achieve this goal, the minister said, citing the launch of the Action on Water, Adaptation, and Resilience (AWARe) during the thematic day of Gender and Water Day of the UN Climate Change Conference (COP27) that was held in the Red Sea city of Sharm El-Sheikh in 2022.

Egypt also launched the "Cairo Call for Action" initiative during the Fifth Cairo Water Week (CWW) 2022, the minister further noted.

It called for establishing a UN action program on water scarcity, in addition to calling on Egypt to appoint a UN special envoy for water affairs, the minister said.

MENA