TransBasin: Transboundary Water Basin Management
Transbasin is an International Research Staff Exchange Scheme (IRSES), under a European project Marie Curie Action (FP7-PEOPLE-2011-IRSES). It is coordinated by Cristina Branquinho at cE3c (FCUL, Portugal).

In many parts of the world, water resources traverse political boundaries. The sustainable management of these transboundary water resources requires regional cooperation among riparian states. In drylands, coupled with physical water scarcity we also find increasing demand for water due to growing populations and expanding economic sectors. In regions in which political relations are fragile, these tensions can prevent the establishment of a lasting peace or even erupt into active conflict.

In this program, we will study the Jordan River basin, shared by Jordan, Israel, and the Palestinian Authority, and the Guadiana River basin, shared by Portugal and Spain. The objective of this program is to provide a scientific forum for the establishment of a common ground for these basins as case studies of conflict and cooperation in river basin management and to identify the principles and mechanisms that both promote and hinder cooperation. Lessons learned from this project can be applied to other transboundary river basins in Europe and throughout the world.

Publications:

Samer Talozi, from the
Masar, has work in Portugal about Sustainable Agriculture in the Jordan River Basin and in Evaluating ecosystem services and habitat quality in the Jordan River Valley using the InVest

Maria Alho, Ana Catarina Luz, Ana Marques, and Inês Ribeiro have worked in Jordan about Ecosystem Services and local perceptions of the Lower Jordan River

Call for grants from Portugal to Jordan, from Portugal to Palestinian Authority, from Jordan to Portugal and from Palestinian Authority to Portugal

Open till the 31st of March 2015.

Partners

1-Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, Center for Transboundary Water Research, Israel.
2-Masar Center, Jordan.
3-Palestinian Wastewater Engineers Group, Palestine.
4-cE3C at Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal

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Researchers:
Cristina Branquinho (coordinator)
Pedro Pinho