WATERAPPS & WATERAPPscale participation in the UDW regional events call

Useful scientific and technological innovations to address delta challenges share a common trait: they help to bridge scales (local to regional, short-term to long-term), and are relevant in multiple domains of policy making, economic development, and technology. We draw from experiences of UDW projects to demonstrate and showcase key insights and relevance for delta development, with a special focus on two innovations, namely the MOTA tool for delta planning, and the Waterapps FarmerSupport app for climate information. Despite contrasting focal scales and sectors, the projects show surprisingly interesting synergies regarding the lessons learned and relevance for the water and agriculture sectors in Vietnam, Bangladesh and beyond. This makes it extra relevant to share the key insights to the wider audience of policy makers, delta professionals and the general public.

We organize an international seminar, complemented with an interactive tool lab session to bring the MOTA and the Waterapps tools to the spotlight. Both tools contribute to:

• Bridging local and regional delta scales and domains as common features that makes innovations useful in the delta contexts.
• Engaging with local stakeholders (e.g. farmer unions, local communities in cities and rural areas) to build capacity and co-develop innovations, as increasingly seen as a highly potential lead in adaptation thinking.
• Understanding how delta wisdom co-created and travelled across the Bangladesh, Dutch and Vietnamese deltas.

The Seminar involving delta policy makers, professionals in water, climate and agriculture sectors e.g. extension officers, and researchers will showcase the UDW tools to illustrate and discuss the above-mentioned items.

The seminar is linked to a Tool lab session, offering young professionals an opportunity to learn and use (1) the MOTA decision support tool, and (2) the Waterapps outcomes aiming towards services uptake and upscaling which is in line with the newly acquired WATERAPPscale Bangladesh UDW III project. By applying these innovative tools to address real delta challenges in water and agriculture in Vietnam and Bangladesh, participants will experience the added values of bridging spatial scales and domains.

The outcomes of the two events will be communicated to policy makers and the general public through blogs and a video clip produced by a professional media partner, namely Nextblue.

The two regional events are co-organized by a consortium of three UDW projects[1]: the Centre for Water and Climate Change WACC Vietnam, the Khulna University Bangladesh, Wageningen University, and IHE Delft. We partner with Nextblue and New Amsterdam Consult businesses, who are implementing complementary communication and media projects in Vietnam and Bangladesh. This partnership with a strong lead and involvement of Vietnam and Bangladesh partners will help strengthen event coordination, local participation and local uptake of the UDW outcomes and outputs.

[1] Three participating UDW projects: Waterapps (W 07.69.204); Strategic Delta Planning (W 07.69.106); and Planning Toolkit for Delta Plan Implementation (W 07.6919.302).