Green Water Governance – need for a new framework

Green water underpins food security, ecosystem health, and climate resilience, yet remains largely invisible in water governance and policy frameworks.

This session will explore how to address green water governance gaps stemming from a fragmented policy and institutional landscape, data and monitoring gaps, and lack of standardized indicators. It aims to bring together experts discussing governance, monitoring, and policy integration challenges related to green water, and to identify pathways for translating emerging green water science into governance and decision-making processes across water, land, and climate policy domains.

While water governance has often focused on blue water, green water, remains largely neglected in policy and planning despite its cross-sectoral nature. Its governance has remained fragmented as multiple agencies operate with unclear mandates and different system boundaries (e.g. river basin versus landscapes and administrative boundaries), resulting in inefficiencies and conflicting priorities.

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