Regional Training on water awareness campaigns in Morocco

19 March 2007

Within the framework of IUCN WESCANA DGCS Regional Water Project, a 6-day-training course entitled "How to Design and Implement a Public Awareness Campaign" is being held during March 19-22, 2007 in Morocco by IUCN WESCANA, InWent Capacity Building and The National Office for Potable Water (ONEP). The course is designed to train about 60 participants from the region within the theme "Network Regionally and Share Nationally". Participates in this course will be actively involved in action learning by applying an interactive approach. The course will utilize the World Water Day (March 22) to involve local communities, youth and women in planning and implementing the campaign.

As a follow up to a similar more theoretical course that was held last September in Syria, it was decided to hold this Regional Training Course in Morocco where participants who were present in the Syria course will apply their knowledge in Public Awareness Campaigns. Participants from Morocco, Tunisia, Palestine, Syria, Jordan, and Yemen will take part in this course.

The main objective of this course is how to enable representatives of Ministries, National Authorities, Media and the Civil Society to design and implement a Public Awareness Campaign. Participants are expected to gain a practical regional experience in designing and implementing awareness campaigns. Networking will be strengthened among the participants and the local involved stakeholders to ensure effective knowledge management.

It is worth noting that this course is part of InWent's four-year program on capacity building in the water sector for the MENA region focussing on eight countries, namely, Algeria, Morocco, Syria, Jordan, Egypt, Palestine, Tunisia and Yemen. The overall objective of this program includes strengthening regional cooperation, development of management strategies for the water sector in selected countries within the MENA region in order to formulate and implement appropriate sector reforms; establish a functional partner network; and promote public awareness on water –related issues.

For more information contact Tarek Abul Hawa at tarek.abulhawa@iucn.org  and Alexandra Press at Alexandra.Pres@inwent.org