Call for Participation: Innovation Workshop on Water Quality Monitoring & Assessment

Innovation Workshop on Water Quality Monitoring & Assessment

The Innovation Workshop on Water Quality Monitoring & Assessment, organized by World Meteorological Organization (WMO), United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) and World Water Quality Alliance (WWQA), co-organized with and supported by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) and in partnership with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), will take place from 27 to 29 September 2023 at the JRC in Petten* (the Netherlands).

* Please note that (1) shuttle transfers will be organised to transport workshop participants from Amsterdam to Petten and back, and (2) a sufficient number of hotel rooms close to the JRC site have been secured for workshop participants.

The 3-day workshop will be a unique experience in pulling collective intelligence to innovate on water quality monitoring and assessment challenges, and to look ahead on how to build momentum and support to go further down the road together.

The following selected challenges will be put forward at the workshop:

• Data to Action: Transforming data into actionable insights for water stewardship (more details)
• Empowering citizen scientists to improve water quality, from monitoring to action (more details)
• Melding AquaWatch & Global Indigenous Knowledge (MAGIK) (more details)
• Routine Monitoring of Antimicrobial Resistance in Water (more details)

The workshop will be designed around:

• SDG Innovation Bootcamp: to (1) learn and practice challenge shaping to improve value proposition, (2) build community to gather key human capital, (3) set up impact business, and (4) peer-review to refine the challenges.
• Hack Day: to (1) work together on exploring and defining innovative ideas and solutions to address the challenges, (2) cross-pitch the ideas and (3) pitch the final take to collectively address the challenges.
• Plan Ahead Together: to collectively plan the next steps of the activities/projects at the interface of community resources and the support of established partnerships.  

Open Call for Participation

To apply to participate in the workshop, please complete and submit the application form below.

Please note that applications are currently open only for self-funded participants. 

The workshop participants are targeted to be from:

• Public and private water quality monitoring agencies;
• National Hydrological Services (NHSs);
• Research & Academia;
• Private sector (solution providers);
• Public and private sectors reliant on water quality monitoring;
• Communities & local citizen science groups;
• International organizations & non-governmental organizations(NGOs);
• Foundations & developing agencies.

The participants will be selected on the basis of the following criteria:

• Relevance of the candidate's expertise and experience;
• Demonstrated motivation;
• Expected contribution;
• Geographic balance;
• Gender balance.
   

Application form