Transboundary Rivers of South Asia (TROSA)

More than 700 million South and South-East Asians depend on the Ganges, Brahmaputra, Meghna (GBM) and Salween river basins for food, water and energy needs. Transboundary river systems and the ecosystem services they provide are increasingly under threat by unregulated infrastructure development, unplanned land use practices and climate change, with strong impact on riverine communities. Many of such communities are disadvantaged by lack of cooperation and lack of capacity to claim their rights over water and related natural resources.

TROSA works with a diverse group of organizations to address these issues.  Building communities’ capacity to participate in water governance, the program aims to achieve the that:

• Government policies and practices in water resource management are more inclusive of community concerns & meet national & international standards,
• Policies and practices of the private sector respect community access to water resources, actively contributing to reduced conflict,
• CSOs increasingly participate in or influence transboundary water governance, women’s inclusion and resolution of water conflicts,
• River basin communities increasingly influence transboundary water governance policies and processes,
• Women have more influence on transboundary water governance, policies & processes. 

TROSA aims to bring in more youth voices and support their meaningful engagement in issues of river water governance. It organizes youth camps to build the capacity of the youth so that they can lead the movement in future.

TROSA is funded by the government of Sweden. The program is implemented by the Oxfam country offices in Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Myanmar, in close partnership with 15 local and national NGOs and 4 regional partners (ICIMOD, SIWI, IR and IUCN). It works closely with other networks and programs working on regional water issues.

From local to regional

TROSA works from local level to regional level. For example, in its second year, TROSA partner NEEDS in Nepal worked closely with local authorities and local sand mining contractors in the Bhimdatta municipality along the Mahakali river to develop environmentally sustainable and socially responsible River Sand Mining Guidelines. The proposed guidelines outline specific measures for environment friendly mining practices that respect communities’ control over mining, for equitable sharing of benefits.

In the same year regional partner ICIMOD convened a high-level international consultative workshop to discuss and identify areas of regional cooperation through an integrated river basins-landscapes approach in the region. The workshop brought together more than 100 participants from over 20 countries and provided an opportunity for donors, lawmakers, civil servants, researchers and policymakers to share their experiences with river-basin management, cross-border landscape approaches, and regional cooperation.

Facts:

Project name:  Transboundary Rivers of South Asia        
Project period: 2017-2021
Target group: Over 100,000 river stakeholders, including community members, government officials, PS players and CSOs.
Location Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna river basins in Nepal, India and Bangladesh, and Salween basin in Myanmar and Thailand.
Budget: €11,371,715

Contact:

TROSA’s Program Management Unit (PMU) is hosted at Oxfam in Cambodia, Phnom Penh.
The program is managed by Oxfam Novib’s ALIVE team. Contact person: rian.fokker@oxfamnovib.nl .
TROSA on Social Media: https://twitter.com/RiversTROSA and https://www.facebook.com/RiversTROSA/

Trosa Brochure 

In the second phase of the program, TROSA partners were able to strengthen people-to-people connections and informal processes for water cooperation, including the Mahakali Sambad, now connected to the Nepal Water-Energy Commission Secretariat through Oxfam in Nepal and to the various local governments in the basin through local partners. The Brahmaputra Dialogue Process (facilitated by ICIMOD) now has participation from four riparian countries (Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, and India), with country chapters shaping up. The Meghna Knowledge Forum (facilitated by IUCN) was able to attract participation from officials, academics, and civil society from both Bangladesh and India, with consensus shaping on Nature-based Solutions (NbS) for the shared challenges of climate change. We have also seen regional institutions like SAARC and BIMSTEC participating in regional dialogues of our partners ADPC and IUCN, as well as representatives from the UN Water Convention Secretariat participating in TROSA events, recognizing the role of the multi-stakeholder forums that TROSA organized. Bangladesh became the first South Asian country to sign up for the UN Water Convention, elevating South Asia's importance in the convention.

Project name: Transboundary Rivers of South Asia Phase-2        
Project period: 2022-2027
Target group
Over 150,000 river basin stakeholders, including riparian community members, women, men, youth and Indigenous People, smallholder farmers, fisherfolk, boat-dwellers and people engaged in water- or natural-resource- based livelihoods such as tourism and trade and CSOs.
Location: Ganges, Brahmaputra and Meghna (GBM) river basins in Nepal, Bhutan, India and Bangladesh, .
Budget: € 7,104, 119

TROSA’s Program Management Unit (PMU) is hosted at Oxfam in Cambodia, Phnom Penh.
The program is managed by Oxfam Novib’s Green team. Contact person: 

info.trosa@oxfam.org
Enamul.Siddique@oxfam.org

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