In 2018, the Dutch water authorities, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management joined forces to work with other organizations around the world to achieve SDG6 in a collaboration called Blue Deal. The Blue Deal program includes 17 international partnerships in which water managers from the Netherlands and other countries work together to achieve the goal of providing 20 million people with access to clean, sufficient and safe water by 2030.
The water managers have entered into a 12-year partnership in which they are working on long-term solutions for the region. Climate adaptation and social inclusion are structural elements of these solutions. The Blue Deal builds the capacity of water authorities in other countries to implement long-term solutions. The focus is on governance and integrated water management.
During Phase I (2019-2022), 16 partnerships, including the one with Burkina Faso, have focused most of their efforts on improving the knowledge and institutional capacities needed for good water governance. In this context, some 20 training modules have been developed for the Local Water Committees of Burkina Faso to improve and strengthen their capacity in water governance