Accra, Sept. 25, GNA - Water experts are meeting in Accra to develop an integrated and coordinated framework on water management and control aimed at streamlining and harmonizing national policies on the Continent.

The five-day workshop on "Developing guidelines for Inter-Basins Water Transfers for Policy Makers in Africa" would look at the modalities for harnessing Africa's largely untapped water resources and propose guidelines for policy makers.

One thorny issue that the workshop must addressed is the problem of defining long term water surplus on the Continent, which experts said had become an uphill task due to the very low adaptive capacity in water resources development and lack of reliable climatic and hydrological data.

Opening the workshop on Monday, Ms Cecilia Dapaah, Deputy Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, said the estimated benefits of the inter-basins water transfer schemes could not be ignored and the more they were delayed, the more costly would proposals become and more difficult to implement.

She said it was pertinent that concerns that have been expressed regarding inter-basin water transfer should be appropriately addressed to guide policy and decision makers in Africa.

Such concerns includes the perception that water would be siphoned from endowed basins to support continued growth in recipient basins and that it would also result in an adverse effects on streams and their vital ecosystems.

Ms Dapaah said "...given the measured pace of harnessing the Continent's vital water resources, a lot more needs to be done to realize our shared vision of attaining an equitable and sustainable use of water resources for poverty alleviation and socio-economic development".

She announced that within the framework of promoting regional integration and cooperation, consultations have been initiated between Togo and Ghana for the transfer of water from downstream of the Volta Lake at Sogakope to supply potable water to Lome.

Speaking on science and inter-basin water transfers, Mr Kodwo Andah, of the Water Resources and Documentation Centre, Italy, said major variations associated with large-scale transfer of water such as the physical, biological and human systems should be analytically considered.

He mentioned water quantity, quality, land implications, atmosphere and the aquatic system, and the socio-cultural issues as some of specifics issues that would pose problems to the integration process. Mr Andah said: "The wide range of interactions with human activities makes definition of surplus water difficult which precluded simple agreement on when water transfer was desirable.=94 He said inter-basins water transfers was almost an imperative, if Africa should harness all its natural resources for a harmonious socio-economic development across the Continent.

Mr Stephen Donkor, Senior Regional Advisor, United Nation Economic Commission for Africa said for Africa to meet its development challenges, the development and promotion of water resources through support for infrastructure projects such as storage dams, irrigation and hydropower structures were imperative. He said to meet the current energy needs for all purposes, the Continent needed to develop its water for energy through hydro-power which was important for the Continent's industrialization drive. 25 Sept. 06