It is now widely accepted that climate change will lead to an intensification of the global hydrological cycle and will have a major impact on regional water resources.

It is also clear that, in many parts of the world, variability in climate conditions, next to many socio-economic and environmental developments, is already having major impacts and that such variability is increasing.

Both present variability and long-term climate change impacts are most severe in a large part of the developing world, and particularly affect the poor in these regions.

Learning objectives

Objectives of the course Climate Change in Integrated Water Management are:

Understanding how climate change can be fitted into the concept of Integrated Water Resources Management
Understanding the climate system and the hydrological cycle and how they are changing
Being aware of the impact of climate change on society
Understanding of dealing with risk and uncertainty in the context of water and climate change and especially variability
Understanding of adaptation options in relation to water and climate change

Target group

The course is designed for professionals actively involved in the water and climate sectors, for example working as policy makers at local, regional or national level, as staff of NGO's or in the private sector dealing with adaptation, or as junior university lecturers or scientists, and would like to receive an overview of the issue within a short period of time.

Partners

Several universities and research institutes in the Netherlands
ICHARM International Centre for Water Hazard and Risk Management (Japan)
UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education

Additional information

The Climate Change in Integrated Water Management course is offered as a two week course. During the first week, the theoretical background will be given. In a one-day field trip, a practical example of dealing with (future) climate change in a municipal water system will be highlighted. In the second week entitled ‘framework for modeling in water and climate’, the participants learn to apply the climate change and variability issues in a set of modeling tools and come up with practical and integrated options to deal with climate issues in water management.