SIWI plays an active role to ensure that water is visible in the global climate talks, such as the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP).

SIWI has attended the COP meetings for the past decade and lobbied hard for water to be included in the the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. The COP26, held in Glasgow in 2021, meant an important breakthrough with greater recognition of the role of water and nature in climate action.

To effectively address climate change, it is important to understand its impact on the water cycle, which opens for a whole range of solutions that are not yet sufficiently used. SIWI tirelessly raises this perspective, often together with other organizations such as Alliance for Global Water Adaptation, AGWA, where SIWI is a founding member and co-chairs the group together with the World Bank. SIWI and AGWA are focal points for water in the Marrakech Partnership for Global Climate Action, which is the UN Climate Convention’s (UNFCCC) platform for non-State party stakeholders.

As part of the Marrakech process, SIWI has supported the UNFCCC secretariat and participated in various international meetings and processes. At the same time, SIWI works with individual countries to help them strengthen their national climate work by increasingly applying water-related solutions.

At the 2021 COP26, SIWI participated actively to share new knowledge on the role of water for climate mitigation as well as adaptation. Thanks to SIWI’s initiative there was also, for the very first time, a Water Pavilion to make it easy for various stakeholders to meet and interact. The close to 100 sessions from the Water Pavilion are now available on SIWI’s Youtube channel, providing an opportunity for anyone to learn more about the important role of water in climate action.