My Dear ANBO members and partners,

all ANBO organs join me to wish each and everyone of you, as well as your loved ones, warm and best wishes for good health, success and a happy and prosperous new year 2020. 

the end of each year represents a major acheivement to everybody, irrespective of whatever challenges or circumstances that one may have faced. the end of the year also offers everyone a perfect occasion to do an indebt retrospection of the year gone by on the one hand, with the aim of learning lessons from errors made and to make a firm commitment better embrase and address similar challenges for a better future.

at the dawn of the year 2020, anbo cannot be an exception to this essential and self-righting exercise.

from every indication, 2019 was indeed overwhelming for anbo. it was a year of major changes. anbo organized, backed by her partners, and held its maiden council meeting in july in tunis. this assises witnessed a rebirth of our continental network; as fresh impetus was provided to attain higher heights. this was evidenced by the resolutions arrived at the close of the meeting. prominent among these wereresolutions on the:

• adoption of the 2016 statutes ushering in major changes in both the netwowork’s governance and financial mechanism;
• improvementof amcow/anbo collaboration;
• evaluation of the anbo ten year (2015-2024) stretagic plan through the evaluation of the five-year (2015-2019) action plan;
• adoption of a road map to ease the elaboration of the 2020-2024 action plan;
• putting in place of a viable system for collecting member financial contributions;
• encouraging recs and member countries by network members in the creation of more r/lbos;
• launching of an appeal to anbo members to develope and put in place perennial programs to enhance data  (especially satellite data) collection and management, as well as encouraging collaboration with ciwa and the african data cube concept.

throughout the period under consideration, anbo also carried out many activities. along these lines, i am pleased to announce these major ones:

• update of the anbo membership database;
• adoption of the revised 2016 statutes,
• organization of discussions with some of anbo’s partners (african water facility, ciwa, inbo, gwp) to improve bilateral and multilateral collaboration;
• carrying out of a study on anbo’s financial options;
• improved visibility of anbo’s projects, contributions and activities in the water domain through effective and efficient participation in major water events (world water week in stockholm, african water week in gabon, gef international workshop on africa water projects in gabarone).

against this backdrop, and bearing in mind the fact that anbo needs to and must play the vangard role of a continental concertation platform  and act as a veritable tool for water cooperation and integration within the concept and objectives of the african water vision 2025, it is evident that for anbo, the pesrpectives for 2020 are both promising and challenging. thus, going by the tunis resolutions, challenges which can be easily identified are:

• improving amcow/anbo collaboration;
• installation and strengthening of the anbo permanent technical secretariat to improve its operational performance and efficiency;
• reinforcing partnership between anbo members and between anbo and her technical and financial partners with a view of developping strategies for improved integrated water resources management, especially within the context of climate change;
• developing close relationships with recs with a view of harnessing resources and techniques for better management of shared water resources and for the mobilisation of financial resources in favour of the r/lbos;
• effective and efficient participation in the preparatory phase of the 2021 world water forum (dakar 2021), in close collaboration with omvs;
• effective implementation of the anbo communication strategy, through upgrading information and data on the sadieau system, and through improved communications on anbo activities.

here thus lies anbo’s challenges for 2020. without any iota of doubt, these challenges could invariably be transformed into huge potentials of opportunities and avenues of greater success for anbo. 

however, for us to witness this transformation, the collective engagement and action of all anbo members, remain our watch word.

to this effect, i am totally convinced that the combined capacities of both anbo members and her technical and financial partners are strong enough to enable her transcend these challenges and carry to its logical end, the responsibility and the aspirations of this renewed vision, which has as its central axle, sustainable management, excelling leadership qualities in the collective management of our water resources, for the well-being of the populations we have been called upon to serve.

may 2020 indeed be a decisive year for our network.