Policy Briefs and Working Papers

2012

2011

Spain uses its natural water resources intensively, mostly in agriculture, thanks to a highly developed dam infrastructure. The limits for extraction of natural resources have largely been reached and climate change is expected to continue lowering natural water endowments markedly in future especially in dry areas of the country.

2009

Promoting Biodiversity Co-Benefits in Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD)

This report examines how biodiversity co-benefits in REDD can be enhanced, both at the design and implementation level.

2007

Feasible Financing Strategies for Water Supply and Sanitation

Adequate supplies of clean water are vital for human health and development. But an important obstacle to achieving water supply and sanitation goals in many countries has been the failure to adequately address financial issues: the costs of achieving goals; how those costs could be minimised; and the challenge of matching costs with available resources. The need for a fresh approach has become evident, for example, as central European countries come to terms with the need to mobilise substantial financial resources to comply with challenging EU environmental requirements, and as many developing countries struggle to achieve the internationally agreed Millennium Development Goals on water and sanitation.

2006

Keeping Water Safe to Drink

Access to water that is safe to drink is vital to human health and to development. Recognising this, world leaders have set themselves the goal of halving by 2015 the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation. This is one of the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) to reduce world poverty set out in the United Nations Millennium Declaration in the year 2000, and reaffirmed at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development.

2006 

Improving Water Management: Recent OECD experience

This policy brief brings together the recent work of the OECD on water management issues. It identifies the main policy challenges addressed by that work for sustainable water management. Among the issues discussed are: performance of water management policies in OECD countries; water pricing; financing of water and wastewater infrastructure; water-related development co-operation; the social aspects of water pricing; biochemical technologies for improving water quality; and aid to the water supply and sanitation sector.

2004

The OECD Environmental Strategy: Progress in Managing Water ResourcesPolicy Brief: The OECD Environmental Strategy: Progress in Managing Water Resources

Water is a vital resource for society but needs to be managed carefully to ensure that people have access to affordable and safe drinking water and sanitation, without depleting water resources or damaging ecosystems. The OECD Environmental Strategy for the First Decade of the 21st Century, adopted by OECD ministers in 2001, highlights water management as one of the key issues in maintaining the integrity of ecosystems.