The regional seminar under the Global Water Partnership in the Central Asia and Caucasus (GWP CACENA) finished its work in Turkmenbashi town on September 20. Within three days the experts of the water industry departments and nature-conservative organisations from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, and the representatives of the Sweden-based GWP Secretariat discussed the water management issues.

The seminar was to address the following topics: the mechanisms of settling the conflicts and disputes over and the guarantees of equal use of transboundary waters and interstate water sources. The participants noted that Turkmen-Uzbek interaction could exemplify an integrated approach to the problems of transboundary water resources management.

The participants showed intense interest in Turkmenistan’s efficient approach for providing better water resources development, management and use, ensuring the proper regulation of water relations in the country. The guests agreed that a number of the large-scale national projects including the Karakum River, construction of the main drain networks, artificial Turkmen Lake and the largest interstate water storage reservoir in the Central Asian region – Dostluk, the Archabil water storage reservoir, the measures taken to improve water supply including construction of the drinking water plants vividly evidenced the effective water resources management policy.

The presentation of the Avaza national tourism zone project was of particular interest to the international experts. The water facilities and waterworks – desalination units, river-channel that would connect Turkmenbashi town and Avaza had been constructed under the project. The guest received the bright impressions of visiting the Khazar State Reserve.

Exchanging views on various aspects of effective international partnership, the integrated approaches to international interaction on water management issues the experts drafted the reports to be presented at the international forums, which would held in Bulgaria, Georgia, Japan this year. The membership of the national and regional delegations to the international meetings was approved at the seminar.

The next GWP CACENA meeting will be held in Tbilisi (Georgia) in November.