Dushanbe, Tajikistan - 24 May 2026 — The United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH), in partnership with the Office of the Co-ordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities (OCEEA) and in collaboration with the Regional Environmental Centre for Central Asia (CAREC), convened the workshop Promoting Collaboration over Shared Waters: Concepts and Approaches for Building Trust and Co-operation from 22–24 May 2026 in Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Supported by the Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC) and funded Blue Peace Central Asia project, the workshop served as a preparatory process for both the Fourth High-Level International Conference on the International Decade for Action "Water for Sustainable Development" 2018–2028 (4th Dushanbe Water Conference) and the 2026 UN Water Conference. The UNU Rector, UN Under-Secretary-General Professor Tshilidzi Marwala, attended the plenary session of the workshop and engaged with the participants as they presented their policy recommendations.
The workshop brought together 30 water professionals and emerging experts from Central Asian countries — Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, both long-standing Women in Water Management Network members and new members joining through the OSCE's Drops of the Future initiative.
The workshop was held under the OSCE’s Women, Water Management and Conflict Prevention — Phase III. The programme aims to strengthen inclusive and participatory water governance by enhancing the capacity of women professionals and increasing their meaningful participation in water-related negotiations, mediation efforts and conflict prevention across Central Asia and Afghanistan.
By fostering women's leadership in transboundary water cooperation and decision-making, the initiative seeks to promote more equitable, resilient and sustainable approaches to water governance in the region.
The workshop was opened on 22 May by Ms. Denise Lüthi Crișan, Director of the Swiss Cooperation Office in Tajikistan, and Mr. Dilovarsho Dustzoda, Advisor to the Executive Director of CAREC. Ms. Sogol Jafarzadeh, UN and Government Relations Coordinator at UNU-INWEH, delivered welcoming remarks on behalf of UNU-INWEH. The workshop was co-facilitated by Ms. Letizia Zuliani, Environmental Affairs Adviser at OSCE, and Ms. Jenni Laakso, Mediation Support Officer, OSCE Conflict Prevention Centre, Mediation Support Officer, OSCE Conflict Prevention Centre.
Over three days, participants explored how global water policy processes function, how scientific evidence can be integrated into water-related negotiations to build trust, and how political dynamics shape the use of data in transboundary settings.
UNU-INWEH facilitated several sessions that provided participants with an overview of the global water policy landscape and introduced confidence-building approaches and comparative experiences from other regions. Ms. Sogol Jafarzadeh led a session on global water policy processes, highlighting key outcomes and priorities related to the Fourth Dushanbe Water Conference and the 2026 United Nations Water Conference, and situating the workshop within these broader international processes. Professor David Feldman, Adjunct Professor of Transboundary Water Cooperation and Policy at UNU-INWEH, delivered an introductory lecture on confidence-building in water negotiations, drawing on experiences from the Middle East, Asia, Africa, and the Americas. He also presented analytical frameworks and practical tools for understanding negotiation dynamics and fostering constructive dialogue in transboundary water cooperation.
OSCE facilitated a session on core skills for collaborative water governance, focusing on active listening, reflective engagement, identifying common ground, and translating dialogue into policy and negotiation outputs.
On the second day, Ms. Sogol Jafarzadeh elaborated on the six interactive dialogues planned for the 2026 UN Water Conference and the emerging opportunities for engagement through the UN Water Conference Academic Hub. Ms. Suyuna Dadybaeva, Advocacy and Policy Development Associate at UNU-INWEH, presented findings from a pre-workshop member survey of the Women in Water Management Network, drawing on 15 respondents and nine questions across two emerging policy tracks. The survey identified five major signals: climate-driven disruption as the most urgent frame; transboundary data-sharing deficits as a significant under-addressed issue; financing and technology for gender-inclusive governance as the highest policy brief priority; political and financial gaps as the primary barriers to progress; and the need to move from symbolic inclusion toward actionable decision-making authority.
Alongside members of the Women in Water Diplomacy Network from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, Ms. Irina Yugay of CAREC facilitated a session on evidence-based policy-making and gender assessment outcomes conducted by the Women Networks of Central Asia and South Caucasus under the Blue Peace Central Asia project.
Participants were then divided into thematic dialogue groups to generate concrete inputs for negotiation and policy brief development, closing with a plenary exchange of cross-cutting themes and priorities.
The workshop produced two policy tracks intended to feed into the 4th Dushanbe Water Conference and the 2026 UN Water Conference:
- Inclusivity in Water Governance: Beyond Representation — the Women in Water Management Network's voice on moving from symbolic participation to genuine decision-making authority for women, youth, scientists, and local actors.
- Data Sharing and Confidence-Building in Transboundary Water — a regional Central Asian voice framing transparent information exchange as a political foundation for trust and long-term co-operation.
A particularly significant outcome was the way the workshop connected inclusivity and transboundary co-operation, treating them not as separate concerns but as mutually reinforcing conditions for durable water governance. Participants consistently emphasized that data-sharing should not merely be used as a technical matter but as a political and confidence-building issue. Their feedback called for explicit attention to financing, accountability, regional co-ordination, science-driven analysis, and the practical realities communities and institutions in Central Asia face. The two sets of policy recommendations produced by the participants were grounded in regional evidence, aligned with the thematic dialogues of the Dushanbe Water Conference and the 2026 UN Water Conference, and presented in front of the UNU Rector and Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, Professor Tshilidzi Marwala, and UNU-INWEH Director, Professor Kaveh Madani, who attended the afternoon plenary presentations.
The policy recommendations were presented at a high-level reception on the evening of 24 May marking UNU-INWEH's 30th anniversary, attended by senior government officials, diplomats, UN leaders, and water professionals from across the region and beyond. In the days following the workshop, participants carried their recommendations into the Women Water Forum, Youth Water Forum, and thematic dialogues of the 4th Dushanbe Water Conference, held 25–28 May 2026. The recommendations will now be developed into policy briefs and published on the UN Water Conference Academic Hub.
Another instance where workshop results carried into Dushanbe conference during the panel “Towards Impactful Basin Level Cooperation: The Role of Transboundary Legal and Institutional Frameworks, Inclusive Governance and Multi-Stakeholder Collaboration”. The panel was part of the Thematic Session on interactive Dialogue (d) Water for Cooperation in Dushanbe Water Conference and featured Ms. Sogol Jafarzadeh from UNU-INWEH alongside government officials from Tajikistan, Malaysia, and Uganda. Ms. Sogol Jafarzadeh spoke on the workshop as an example of successful inclusive governance and multi-stakeholder collaboration.
The policy recommendations were also mentioned during the closing session of the Dushanbe Water Conference, where rapporteurs of the Youth, Women and Food Forums presented in a session, chaired by H.E. Prime Minister of the Republic of Tajikistan, Mr. Qohir Rasulzoda, and the Under-Secretary-General for UN-DESA, Mr. Li Jinhua.
On 27 May, building on the recently signed agreement between UNU-INWEH and OSCE, UNU Rector and Under-Secretary-General Prof. Tshilidzi Marwala and UNU-INWEH Director Prof. Kaveh Madani held bilateral talks with H.E. Ambassador Bakyt Dzhusupov, Co-ordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities, and Ambassador Salome Steib, Head of the OSCE Programme Office in Dushanbe. Both sides reflected on the results of the regional workshop, including the drafting of policy briefs for the UN Water Conference Academic Hub, and discussed deepening cooperation in anticipatory tools, education for risk prevention, and science diplomacy at the science-policy interface.
