Discussion | A Path Forward for Women, Water, Peace and Security: Elevating Central Asian Voices (in-person and online)

From March 22-24, 2023, the United Nations will convene the first UN Water Conference in 50 years. This important conference will bring thousands of water champions to New York City to advanced shared goals to address the critical state of global freshwater resources. Despite long efforts to foster inclusive policy dialogue spaces, many critical global water and climate dialogues retain rigid gender barriers negatively impacting women’s equal participation and influence. Despite these persistent barriers, members of the Women in Water Diplomacy Network will be participating throughout the UN Water Conference with focus on elevating a diversity of perspectives to impact the trajectory of water and peace related policy dialogues at this seminal global event. This event sponsored by the Harriman Institute for Russian, Eurasian and East European Studies, will feature women water experts engaged in the Women in Water Diplomacy Network from across Central Asia and Afghanistan in an effort to foster dialogue and knowledge sharing.

The Women in Water Diplomacy Network consists of members of the Women in Water Diplomacy Network in the Nile (initiated in 2017), the Women in Water Management Network in Central Asia and Afghanistan (initiated in 2021) as well as the supporters of both networks and representatives of newly developing basin communities in Africa and the Americas including the Zambezi River Basin Commission, the Okavango River Basin Commission, the Orange-Senqu River Basin Commission and the International Joint Commission. The Networks include representatives of the Ministries of Water and Foreign Affairs or other related ministries as well as informal influential intermediaries such as academics and civil society leaders from dozens of countries on the frontlines of water insecurity including Afghanistan, Angola, Botswana, Canada, Egypt, Ethiopia, Eswatini, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Lesotho, Rwanda, South Africa, Somalia, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Uganda, United States, Uzbekistan, Zambia and Zimbabwe.