{"id":2505,"date":"2022-08-05T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-08-04T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/news\/gwp-cee-supports-drought-management-in-the-drin-basin-and-armenia\/"},"modified":"2026-04-25T08:13:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-25T07:13:09","slug":"gwp-cee-supports-drought-management-in-the-drin-basin-and-armenia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/archive\/gwp-cee-supports-drought-management-in-the-drin-basin-and-armenia\/","title":{"rendered":"GWP CEE supports drought management in the Drin Basin and Armenia"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Two projects have been successfully finalized, <\/span>capitalizing<\/span> on <\/span>GWP CEE\u2019s <\/span>experience <\/span>in integrated drought management <\/span>(IDM) <\/span>and <\/span>continuing good practices<\/span> and partnerships <\/span>with <\/span>cross regional<\/span> implementation<\/span>. <\/span>One of the <\/span>fundamental blocks<\/span> of GWP<\/span>\u2019<\/span>s <\/span>mission for a <\/span><\/span>Water Secure <\/span>World <\/span><\/span>is <\/span>decreasing the<\/span> drought <\/span>impact and vulnerability<\/span>. <\/span>As such<\/span>, the <\/span><\/span>Integrated Drought Management <\/span>Programme<\/span><\/span><\/a> (IDMP) serves as <\/span>an essential means of achieving that goal. <\/span>Integrated Drought Management <\/span>mitigates drought risk and builds drought resilience by addressing multiple components of drought management, including disaster risk reduction, climate adaptation strategies, and national water policies.<\/span><\/span>
<\/span><\/p>\n

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D<\/span>rin Project<\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n
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IDMP<\/span> for Drin Basin Project was a project funded by<\/span> the <\/span><\/span>National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration<\/span><\/span><\/a> funds via <\/span>GWP<\/span>O <\/span>from<\/span> January to August 2022. The objective of the project was to further advance <\/span>I<\/span>DM <\/span>in Drin Basin countries<\/span> –<\/span> North Macedonia, Albania, Kosovo. <\/span>The project capitalize<\/span>d<\/span> on the solution developed by <\/span><\/span>DriDanube p<\/span>roject<\/span><\/span><\/span> and other <\/span>IDMP CEE<\/span><\/span><\/a> activities since 2011.<\/span> The <\/span>project was <\/span>funded by <\/span>NoAA<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>The partners involved in this project were<\/span> GWP CEE (project manager)<\/span>, <\/span><\/span>Slovenian Environment Agency: Drought Management Centre <\/span>South Eastern<\/span> Europe<\/span><\/span><\/a> (DMCSEE)<\/span>, <\/span><\/span>Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts<\/span><\/span><\/a> (ZRC SAZU)<\/span>, and <\/span><\/span>Global Change Research Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences<\/span><\/span><\/a> (CzechGlobe)<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>The p<\/span>roject concept and start up activities<\/span> were executed by GWP<\/span>CEE and DMCSEE. A crucial step for achieving the objectives was to identify and <\/span>connect with <\/span>cooperation partners which have institutional mandate, position-related responsibilities, and personal interest to advance drought management in their country. <\/span>Simultaneously, <\/span>all <\/span>partners<\/span> were involved in expert identification of tools and solution<\/span>s<\/span> developed in previous projects <\/span>that proved to be <\/span>beneficial and easy to adopt in target countries.

<\/span><\/span>One such <\/span>solution was the <\/span><\/span>Droug<\/span>h<\/span>tWatch<\/span><\/span><\/span>, a<\/span> web platform for sharing and <\/span>analyzing<\/span> drought related datasets. <\/span>Partners have <\/span>compiled<\/span> instructions on how to prepare dat<\/span>. <\/span>Instructions included information <\/span>starting from <\/span>data format<\/span> a<\/span>ll the way to<\/span> file system structure.

<\/span><\/span>National reporting network systems<\/span><\/span><\/a> to monitor drought and drought impacts was<\/span> a<\/span> second suggested solution. The system is built upon expert reporters giving regular feedback on local soil moisture and drought impacts in agriculture, forestry, viticulture, and similar industries through a simple online questionnaire. <\/span>Such monitoring <\/span>has a great value, <\/span>since the experts usually know <\/span>about drought onset<\/span>, but they don<\/span><\/span>\u2019t know the exact impact<\/span> which people feel and cope with.<\/span>Reporting by the reporters help to <\/span>measure<\/span> the impact, <\/span>assess<\/span> damages, and <\/span>it <\/span>can be link<\/span>ed<\/span> to payment schemes. <\/span>This,<\/span> in turn<\/span>,<\/span> profit<\/span>s<\/span> the <\/span>rapporteurs<\/span>. <\/span><\/span>Implementation of this solution <\/span>required the development of guidelines <\/span>contain<\/span>ing<\/span> the necessary steps to kick start the cooperation in<\/span> the<\/span> country.

<\/span><\/span>At the same time as the guidelines and protocols were being prepared, t<\/span>he <\/span>project partners <\/span>held a kick-off meeting to consult<\/span> countries<\/span> about their needs in terms of IDM<\/span>. <\/span>It <\/span>was the first opportunity to introduce the country teams and the <\/span>condition<\/span> of IDM in respective countries.<\/span>In the discussion session <\/span>various<\/span>topics were tackled, including status of drought monitoring <\/span>in relation<\/span> to data and indices and <\/span><\/span>Drought Early Warning<\/span>,<\/span> part of drought monitoring and risk assessment<\/span>,<\/span> which they <\/span>envisioned<\/span> to be strengthened. <\/span>Countries<\/span> provided<\/span> written <\/span>statements<\/span> about their short-term and long-term needs in terms of IDM<\/span> after the meeting<\/span>.

T<\/span><\/span>he targeted capacity building <\/span>program<\/span> was<\/span> designed<\/span> by GWP CEE<\/span>. <\/span>Firstly, regional training was accompanied by <\/span>a <\/span>country-specific national consultation. Secondly, an innovative, client-oriented approach was selected to develop<\/span> the<\/span> training. <\/span>DMCSEE, ZRC SAZU and Czech Globe were<\/span> involved<\/span> as lecturers in the training, and supervisors<\/span> in pre- and post-meeting <\/span>national <\/span>consultations<\/span>. <\/span>The whole <\/span>concept<\/span>was <\/span>based on the countries\u2019 needs<\/span> and<\/span> adopted a unique approach<\/span> while <\/span>focusing on the practical use of the tools and targeted discussions<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>The resulting actions were summarized<\/span> by <\/span>the <\/span>partners on the final <\/span>creative workshop<\/span>. The countries presented actions made regarding national and regional data preparation for integration to drought watch, and steps made to set-up the national monitoring networks. <\/span>Keynote<\/span> inputs were <\/span>given,<\/span>and t<\/span>he meeting has been visited by guests from IDMP Global (Valentin Aich, Katrin Ehlert), Global Water Partner<\/span>ship<\/span> Mediterranean (<\/span>Dejan<\/span>Panowski<\/span>), who provided wider context for partners on global and regional perspectives on drought management.

<\/span><\/span>Mirjana Ivanov<\/span>, <\/span>the h<\/span>ead of the Department of Applied Meteorology and Climate Change<\/span>, <\/span>IHMS<\/span>Montenegro<\/span>, h<\/span>eld<\/span> a keynote on the use of Drought Watch in practice and follow up activities of the <\/span>DriDanube<\/span>p<\/span>roject<\/span>. Facilitated discussion on further perspectives took place, and partners suggested r<\/span>egional cooperation offers improvements<\/span>, and defined activities which might be achievable within one <\/span>to<\/span> five years. <\/span>The<\/span> follow up activities <\/span>will be held <\/span>in the <\/span>autumn <\/span>of<\/span> 2022. <\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

 <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Integrated Drought Management in Armenia<\/span> <\/span><\/h4>\n<\/div>\n
\n

The second NOAA funded project <\/span>took place in Armenia<\/span>, <\/span>in the framework of Activity 1 \u2013 Knowledge & Capacity building products, science, and dissemination<\/span>. <\/span>Studies have shown that droughts<\/span> in the mountainous country of Armenia<\/span> with sensitive arid climate conditions<\/span> are observed in <\/span>its<\/span> lower regions almost every year<\/span>.<\/span>I<\/span>n the foothill regions<\/span>,<\/span> recurrence of droughts is about 50%. According to drought indices, the number of strong and very strong droughts during the period of 2000-2017 increased by 33 days relative to the baseline average (87) for 1961-1990.

<\/span><\/span>Acknowledging the importance of drought and water scarcity in Armenia and responding to the challenges arisen, the Interdepartmental Committee was set up in 2021 by the order of the <\/span>Armenian<\/span> Prime Minister.

<\/span><\/span>The goal of the <\/span>IDMP <\/span>project<\/span>, <\/span>initiated and <\/span>implemented by Country Water Partnership Armenia <\/span>(CWP Armenia) <\/span>and GWP CEE, <\/span>was <\/span>to identify the existing legal, institutional and management gaps in drought control sector in the country, to clarify the directions of drought monitoring, early response, risk management and consequence elimination systems and to develop the content of the integrated drought management plan model jointly with the stakeholders.<\/span> While the<\/span> partners identified weaknesses and gaps of the system and suggested pathways for IDMP content<\/span>,<\/span> GWP CEE started with a preparation of a set of suggestions for possible <\/span>outline of IDMP<\/span> within the scope of Armenia<\/span> as well as <\/span>prepared a check list <\/span>for the survey on current status of drought management<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>At first, <\/span>a<\/span> desk study to identify stakeholder<\/span>s<\/span> was conducted. Departments of state institution and non-governmental organisation responsible for the <\/span><\/span>3 pillars of drought management<\/span><\/span><\/a> where identified. Bilingual survey questionnaire was developed by CWP <\/span>Armenia,<\/span> based on the checklist provided by GWPCEE. The questionnaires were sent to all interested <\/span>stakeholders<\/span> with<\/span>f<\/span>our chapters identified <\/span>within<\/span>: <\/span>1. <\/span>Determining drought monitoring<\/span>, 2. <\/span>National legislation addressing drought<\/span>,<\/span> 3. <\/span>National institutions and their responsibilities on drought<\/span>, 4. <\/span>Analysis of management measures\/good practices<\/span>. <\/span>Based on the <\/span>results<\/span>, the definite list of key stakeholders was prepared.

<\/span><\/span>Following the identification of relevant stakeholders, a<\/span> working group was set up which included representatives of governmental institutions and departments, as well as independent experts in the field of drought. <\/span>A study was conducted to identify the legal and institutional system regulating the field of drought management, the functions of the departments<\/span> as well as<\/span> the availability of information and data on drought management in Armenia. <\/span>Five participatory stakeholder meeting<\/span>s <\/span>were held <\/span>with a resulting report on<\/span> “Analysis of the Drought Management System in Armenia, Identification of Weaknesses and Gaps”.

<\/span><\/span>Stakeholder consultancy<\/span>, <\/span>as a<\/span> separate task, <\/span>had different phases. <\/span>D<\/span>uring the stakeholder mapping, the stakeholders were consulted<\/span> about<\/span> the nomination of the working group<\/span> members<\/span>. <\/span>A part of it was an<\/span>identification of institutional and legal capacity of main stakeholders\u2019 institutions. Based on those<\/span>,<\/span> the CW<\/span>P Armenia<\/span>,<\/span>the<\/span> working group <\/span>as well as invited<\/span> independent experts prepared the documents for stakeholder consultancy. <\/span>At the workshop held in <\/span>Aghveran<\/span>, Armenia<\/span>, <\/span>two <\/span>documents developed within the framework were discussed with the stakeholders<\/span>. The<\/span> documents were the<\/span> already mentioned <\/span>Analysis of the Drought Management System in Armenia<\/span>, and the <\/span>Content of the Drought Management Plan<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>A special <\/span>participant of the workshop, <\/span>Deputy Minister of Environment, Mrs. <\/span>Gayane <\/span>Gabrielyan<\/span>, ex<\/span>pressed her willingness to assist in the implementation<\/span>. <\/span>National d<\/span>rought management strategy and program of measures will be necessary, and it can be the next step in case of possible financing. <\/span>On behalf<\/span> of Mrs. <\/span>Gabrielyan<\/span> and to <\/span>present <\/span>the results as well clarify the actions and further steps<\/span>,<\/span>a working meeting was organized in June 2022<\/span>. The<\/span> meeting was attended by the <\/span>members of the Interdepartmental Committee<\/span> as well as <\/span>the UNDP DRR Program Coordinato<\/span>r<\/span>.

<\/span><\/span>As <\/span>the drought management program document <\/span>has been developed<\/span>, <\/span>the <\/span>partners concluded that now it needs to<\/span> achieve a <\/span>legal status<\/span> in order to be implemented effectively<\/span>. <\/span>Overall d<\/span>rought management strategy development, as well as follow up with provided recommendations are the next steps<\/span>identified by<\/span> CWP Armenia<\/span>.<\/span><\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

GWP CEE capitalized on Integrated Drought Management Programme practices to enhance the outcomes of two transregional drought-related projects.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3302,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"iawp_total_views":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[21],"class_list":["post-2505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive","tag-central-and-eastern-europe"],"acf":[],"spectra_custom_meta":{"_sidebar_content":["field_69d4d421acab1"],"sidebar_content":["

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\n

IDMP Final Report<\/h1>\n <\/div>\n
\n
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\"IDMP<\/a><\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/article><\/div><\/div>"],"_old_url":["field_69d4d472acab2"],"old_url":["https:\/\/www.gwp.org\/en\/GWP-CEE\/WE-ACT\/news\/2022\/gwp-cee-supports-drought-management-in-the-drin-basin-and-armenia\/"],"_last_date":["field_69d4d498acab3"],"last_date":["8\/5\/2022"],"_event_start":["field_69d4d4c4acab4"],"event_start":[""],"_event_end":["field_69d4d4dcacab5"],"event_end":[""],"_scrape_id":["field_69d4d4ebacab6"],"scrape_id":["01-GWP-English"],"_wp_page_template":["default"],"_thumbnail_id":["3302"],"_uag_page_assets":["a:9:{s:3:\"css\";s:0:\"\";s:2:\"js\";s:0:\"\";s:18:\"current_block_list\";a:14:{i:0;s:13:\"core\/freeform\";i:1;s:11:\"core\/search\";i:2;s:10:\"core\/group\";i:3;s:12:\"core\/heading\";i:4;s:20:\"core\/latest-comments\";i:5;s:9:\"core\/list\";i:6;s:14:\"core\/list-item\";i:7;s:19:\"rank-math\/toc-block\";i:8;s:14:\"core\/accordion\";i:9;s:19:\"core\/accordion-item\";i:10;s:22:\"core\/accordion-heading\";i:11;s:20:\"core\/accordion-panel\";i:12;s:14:\"core\/paragraph\";i:13;s:10:\"core\/image\";}s:8:\"uag_flag\";b:0;s:11:\"uag_version\";s:10:\"1779459527\";s:6:\"gfonts\";a:0:{}s:10:\"gfonts_url\";s:0:\"\";s:12:\"gfonts_files\";a:0:{}s:14:\"uag_faq_layout\";b:0;}"]},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1.jpg",640,300,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1-300x141.jpg",300,141,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1.jpg",640,300,false],"large":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1.jpg",640,300,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1.jpg",640,300,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2026\/04\/idmp-640x300-1.jpg",640,300,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"satsiriwinberg@gmail.com","author_link":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/author\/satsiriwinberggmail-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"GWP CEE capitalized on Integrated Drought Management Programme practices to enhance the outcomes of two transregional drought-related projects.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2505"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2839,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2505\/revisions\/2839"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gwpo-gwp.org\/cee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}