Nile Eco-VWU Regional Research project
In 2014, NBCBN took the lead and succeed in collaboration with regional and international partners including (Makerere University, Uganda, Egerton University, Kenya, Ain Shams University, Egypt, UNESCO Chair for Water Resources, Sudan, UNESCO-IHE, The Netherlands, The Faculty of Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation (ITC) of the University of Twente, the Netherlands, Szent István University (SIZU), Hungary , WaterCap, Kenya, CapNet-UNDP) to get approval on funding from CGIAR- WLE program for Nile basin and East Africa for the research project: Nile Ecosystems Valuation for wise use (Nile Eco-VWU), the project involved more than 30 researchers and included four case studies from the Nile basin focusing on developing and testing integrated tools for ecosystem services economic valuation, that can be applied at local and regional scales within the Nile Basin with high consideration to gender and social aspects better livelihoods. The project was concluded in 2016 with successful research and training outputs and future recommendations based on four regional case studies from the Nile basin on wetlands ecosystems.
“Open Water Diplomacy Lab” Research Project
In 2016 NBCBN joined this research project as a regional research network in the Nile, the project was led by UNESCO-IHE including partners (African Water Journalists Networks, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, Department of Media Studies, SciDev-Net). This project was funded by DUPC2 program and it was a successful project focusing on water diplomacy: the role of media and their interaction with science and politics to contribute positively to water debates and negotiations. The network contributed to this project with research members who were engaged with water journalists in research and training activities. The project was successfully concluded in 2019.
Water Scarcity Research Theme
In 2017 and in close cooperation with IHE- Delft, NBCBN initiated the call for research proposals under the Water scarcity research theme which was one of the key research topics for NBCBN. The selected three funded research projects were kicked off in 2018 in a regional workshop in Uganda. The projects started their activities from 2018 and due to Covid-19 lockdown and delay in filed work implementation for some groups it expected to report results and research outputs by mid of 2022. The projects involve seven countries from the basin (Tanzania, Uganda, Sudan, Egypt, Rwanda, Burundi). The theme includes three research projects focusing on water scarcity issues with a number of case studies from the basin.
- Evaluation of Climate Variability and Change Impacts on Water Scarcity for Rain-fed Agriculture in the Lake Victoria Basin, The Case of Kagera River Sub-basin. (project lead is Dar es Salam University-Tanzania and involved partner countries include; Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi)
- Managing Transboundary Water Resource, Under Climate Change/Variability, Case of Tekeze/Atbara River. (Project Lead Institute is UNESCO Chair for Water Resources-Sudan, and involved partner is HRI-Egypt)
- Integrating GIS, Remote Sensing, And Modelling for Overcoming Water Shortage In Irrigation Network (Lead Partner Institute is HRI-Egypt and partners are UNESCO Chair for Water Resources-Sudan and South Sudan)
