As part of the promotion of INBO associated program in South Asia, a representative of INBO Permanent Technical Secretariat (Denis Fourmeau) attended Kandy water conference in January 2002.

This conference was divided into two parts:

• The SASNET-RBO planning meeting on January 10thand 11th
• The 10th GWP-South Asia (SASTAC) meeting 13^th to 15^th

INBO had been invited by Sri-Lankan organizers to contribute to plenary discussions and working groups held during these meetings, notably the first two days which gathered members of country water partnerships of the region (Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh) and donors.

The various country papers which were presented emphasized at the same time a general will to develop river basin management, and also an obvious lack of realism regarding means to implement in order to reach this objective. If the concepts of integrated basin management are indeed generally acknowledged and understood, the issue of financing (user and pollution fees, water pricing…) remains largely taboo. This attitude shows someway where do these different countries really stand in terms of implementation of RBOs: easy and "free" initiatives are launched with NGOs (such as implementation of users committees at watershed level), or workshops and seminars with GWP or other donors support, but when it comes to the real creation of "serious" RBOs it becomes every difficult to find partners and mobilize financing. This is precisely where INBO could help.

Among other problems who delay implementation of RBOs in South Asia, the very slow diffusion of information, not only between different countries, but also inside the countries themselves, is undoubtedly paramount. In this regard, it is symptomatic that a representative from India, adviser to the central government, mentioned Sabarmati as a likely candidate pour an IWRM project, ignoring that local government of Gujarat created last year its first basin committees within the framework of a project launched in 1998 with support of INBO Permanent Technical Secretariat!

As of today, Sri Lanka has already, through Mahaweli River Authority (MASL), a structured organization who was so far mainly a development authority (dams, irrigation infrastructures). However, MASL is progressively being transformed into a genuine RBO as understood by INBO. Therefore, Sri Lanka should take the lead into the region en terms of IWRM through basins, and MASL should become the coordinating agency for setting up and managing the network SASNET-RBO (MASL has already provided office facilities and support staff to start the network, with seed funds from World Bank). A proposed work plan 2002-2004 (cf. attachment) for the implementation of the network has been approved during the meeting. The objective is clearly to mobilize resources from the donors. Each country is expected to identify basins who could be likely candidates for initial study and documentation. Some technical assistance could be brought by IWMI in Colombo.

INBO representative stressed that SASNET-RBO objectives were perfectly consistent with those of INBO, that INBO was obviously at its disposal to help into these projects, and that we would be glad, on the medium term, to welcome SASNET-RBO as INBO third regional network. However, it must be kept in mind that INBO should be careful not to appear as willing to take over this initiative, to avoid arousing susceptibilities among different countries in the region. As a first step, INBO should merely offer its services (e.g: hosting of the network on INBO web site) and advice, in close cooperation and coordination with the Sri Lankan partners who have the advantage of maintaining good relations with both India and Pakistan, countries whose joint agreement is indispensable to ensure success of any regional initiative…