RP TROSA 2.0 - SEI Between 2017 and 2022, the Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA) was implemented by Oxfam along with 10local and five regionalpartners across the Ganga Brahmaputra Meghna Basin (GBM). This programme was one of the largest initiatives in the region followingclosely after the completion of the IUCN led Ecosystems for Life Project that ran its course in December 2014. This was followed bysmall efforts that was supported by The Asia foundation (TAF) and notably implemented by IUCN, the International Water Association (IWA) among others.

The shared waters of South Asia have been a source of much debate and politics between member countries. There are bilateral treaties between member countries, including, Pakistan and India, India and Nepal, Bangladesh and India but as on datethere is no multilateral river basin organization in the South Asian region. Unlike the Mekong region, where member riparian countries have the Mekong River Commission; in South Asia, the riparian countries have a long way togo in terms of developing an inclusiveand just shared mechanism to sustain the basin and its people. It is against this background, that TROSA has been able to create impactful positive momentum for transboundary cooperation on shared water resources inSouth Asia. As the final report on TROSA mentions, “one of the program’s key successes was in bringing together a diverse range of community and civil society actors across the region and supporting them to engage in water governance processes with a collective voice.”

TROSA has been instrumental in strengthening grassroots diplomacy that has resulted in several interesting local arrangements between communities across political borders sharing the common river and its resources. Among the ones that have been highlighted include the establishment of cross-border flood early warning communication systems, and the signing of joint declarations and agreements by civil society leaders and local governments committing to more inclusive and sustainable water governance. The empowerment of women and their strengthened voice and participation in decision-making processes around the water and other natural resources that they, and their communities depend on, was also highlighted as a notable achievement.

To build on the achievements of TROSA, the second phase, “Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA) Phase-2: Rivers, Rights and Resilience (T2:3R)” has been conceptualized with existing and some new partners. The focus will remain on strengthening local andriparian communities in being able to take informed decisions and engage in sustainable livelihoods, while at the same time the programme will continue to build on the efforts to foster cooperation regionally and at higher levels of governance. The programme identifies climate change as a threat multiplier and in this phase will focus on understanding the multiple vulnerabilities and pathways to address them. The programme work will focus on mitigating climate change-related risks, and to conserve the river basin ecosystems for both people and nature.

SEI is one of the new partners joining this consortium and looking forward to contributing through co-producing knowledge to better inform stakeholders in the basin on the state of resources, and providetools and pathways that foster resilience and sustain the rivers, its people. SEI will bring its knowledge, tools and experiences to better inform the state of knowledge on climate change and inform decision making across local, national and regional scales for better adapting to the changing climate.

• Project context:
Building on the achievements of TROSA, SEI is keen to work with consortium members contributing to inclusive transboundary water governance in the GBM basin. SEI proposes to work intwo basins, Meghnaand Brahmaputra (SEI would further narrow down to sub basins, as we progress, in consultation with Oxfam and basin consortium partners) to develop tools and pilot work on inclusive participatory water resources planning across local, and transboundary scales to help in better planning and management of shared water resources. SEI would also be working closely with Oxfam and other consortium partners to strengthen gender equality and social inclusion indicators that will contribute to improved results for governance of shared resources across the Ganga Brahmaputra and Meghna basin.

SEI brings on board its experience of running the sustainable Mekong research network (SUMERNET) for over a decade half and now, in the Mekong countries focused on building research capacities, and supporting research to policy processes/impacts towards reducing water insecurity and vulnerabilities of marginal and at-risk communities. SEI has initiated a new program(the Mekong Think Thanks Programme) in the region in collaboration with 25 consortium partners, building on the learning from SUMERNET to establish an alliance of think tanks that work in the region to further strengthen evidence-based research informing and influencing policy decisions in the regionand the Mekong countries focusing on water energy and climatechange issues.

SEI leads the development of Water Evaluation and Planning System (WEAP, www.weap21.org) as a tool for an integrated water resources planning. It provides a comprehensive, flexible and user-friendly framework for policy analysis.  Because freshwater management challenges are increasingly common. Allocation of limited water resources between different sectors now requires the full integration of supply, demand, water qualityandecological considerations. WEAP incorporates these issues into a practical yet robust tool for integrated water resources planning. WEAP has been used about 30,000 experts from 181 countries around the world.

SEIwould like to apply the Robust DecisionSupport (RDS) Framework and modelling tools in the sub basins of Meghna and/or Brahmaputra basins to provide scientific information and scenario-based analysis for participatory transboundary water resources management underchanging climate. SEIis alsokeen to utilize our capacity on remote sensing/GIS techniques to develop a large-scale monitoring tool for tracking river morphological changes in particularly Brahmaputra basin to support local governments to manage riverbank erosion better. Theremote sensing/GIS techniques can also be applied to monitor changes in wetlands across the region which we can explore if there is the need from stakeholders. We will use participatory approach to co-produce the decision support tools. This will also begeared towards building capacity of the end users to ensure sustainability and ownership of the systems that are developed.

SEI has extensive experience in strengthening cooperation and collaboration among countries in transboundary river basins such as Mekong,Ayeyarwady, Chindwin, and Kosi basins. We have strong capacity to design and organize policy dialogues and develop policy frameworks for transboundary river governance. SEI could contribute to the project by providing expert inputs and co-designing on knowledge exchange regarding international water laws and conventions, benefit sharing principles, nature-based solutions (NbS) and ecosystems-based approaches (EbA) concepts for transboundary cooperation. We are keen to support the project team and partners inthe development of a transboundary basin strategy and a transboundary biodiversity framework strategy.