On 22-23 March, in honour of World Water Day, ICLEI Member Izmir Metropolitan Municipality (Turkey) hosted the Sustainable Water Policy Summit in Cities. The event convened experts, advocates and leaders, including ICLEI Secretary General Gino van Begin, Mayor of ICLEI Member Bonn (Germany) and ICLEI Co-Chair Katja Dörner, and UN-Habitat Executive Director Maimunah Shariff.

The Summit centred on ensuring water resilience, sustainability and justice in cities. It culminated in 11 Turkish Mayors – including the leaders of ICLEI Members Izmir and Mersin – signing an ‘Alternative Water Management Manifesto’.

This declaration calls for Turkey to adopt five water management principles. Namely, it calls for: the creation of a participatory water management model; managing water demand via policies that regulate, for example, water use in agriculture and industry; ensuring integrated planning at the basin level for water investments; regulating water so as to protect the natural water cycle; and the cyclical use of water in the ecosystem and in various sectors.

Tunç Soyer, Mayor of Izmir Metropolitan Municipality and member of ICLEI’s Global Executive Committee, expressed (translated from Turkish): “This World Water Day, we mapped a route to mitigate the effects of the climate crisis and combat drought. As mayors of 11 metropolitan cities and 11 provinces, we will work until the water policy we have outlined is established in our country.”

For more information on the Summit and the resulting Alternative Water Management Manifesto, click here.