Opening Remarks:
Professor klaus Toepfer
Executive Director, United Nations Environment Programme

Klaus Toepfer

Mr. Toepfer began his presentation by congratulating the WCD for organising the event and expressed his gratitude to the government of Egypt and his Excellency Mr Abu-Zeid for hosting the meeting and their hospitality. The Director shared with the audience that despite his current portfolio he started his professional life decades ago working with GTZ here in Egypt as part of a team evaluating the Katalah depressions (which was subsequently not built).

The director was glad to announce his organisation was working in partnership with the WCD on a joint initiative named "Environmental and Socio-Economic Impacts of Large Dams" supported by the Turner Foundation under a challenge grant, a portion of which is supporting the current consultation.

It is my great pleasure to address this distinguished audience attending this important Regional Consultation for Africa and Middle East of the World Commission on Dams. I would like to congratulate the World Commission on Dams for organising this event. Our gratitude extends to the Government of Egypt for hosting this consultation and for their hospitality.

Throughout human history, human beings have endeavoured to take the maximum advantage of natural resources on Earth and protect themselves from natural calamities. For this purpose, humans have modified river systems to prevent flood disasters, provide abundant water supplies for irrigation and household, and produce energy.

Large dams are a typical example of such modification of river systems, which are an important part of the natural environment. These dams provide power, water for household consumption, flood control, irrigation water, navigation routes and recreational opportunities.

 However, the adverse ecological impacts associated with the blockage of a natural water system are plentiful. These negative impacts include impacts on downstream ecosystems, change in water quality and the status of reservoirs and rivers and change of local and regional climate.

The controversy surrounding dam building has also stimulated environmental action. People living very close to the dams are also the recipients of these negative impacts. They have started voicing their strong concerns on the impacts of dams on the environment and their life.

The issue is also closely linked with global changes, such as conservation of biological diversity and climate change. Let us not forget that if we add the ecological changes caused by large dams around the world, they have the potential of affecting the global environment.

Although there is no agreed definition of large dams, it is widely believed that the world's rivers are obstructed by more than 40 000 large dams. In the USA alone, there are 75 187 dams as per the 1995-1996 National Inventory of Dams. In some parts of the world, many plans for constructing new dams are being cancelled. While in some other countries, large dams are still being planned or constructed despite the controversies.

As we all understand, there is an uneven distribution of large dams. Five countries, the USA, India, PR China, Spain and Japan, have more than 5 000 dams higher than 30m. This constitutes approximately 60% of the world's dams of this size.
The global hydroelectricity production is approximately two million GWh, 66% of which is produced by Canada, the USA, Brazil, PR China, Russia and Japan. There is also an uneven distribution in dam development potentials as well.

A sustainable development approach to dam building entails the use of harmonised approaches that take into consideration benefits as well as negative impacts of large dams from their construction, operation and decommissioning. Recent debates on dams have focussed mainly on specific aspects or large dam construction, such as people to be displaced or impacts on specific ecosystems. These are however based on limited data and information, and few discussions have focussed on methodologies to deal with the dams issues in a comprehensive and sustainable manner.

The World Commission on Dams was established for compiling and presenting information on every aspect of dam construction, operation and decommissioning so that people involved in dam issues can take a balanced perspective to make a better decision.
Using its experiences and expertise, UNEP has launched the "Joint Initiative between World Commission on Dams and United Nations Environment Programme - Environmental and Social-Economic Impacts of Large Dams", which has been financially supported by the Turner Foundation with the funding level of US$2.6 million.

I sincerely believe that this joint initiative will contribute to the implementation of the workplan for the World Commission on Dams. UNEP places great importance to Africa. And therefore, we have decided to support the current regional consultation, among various regions, under this project.

According to the data from the International Commission on Large Dams (ICOLD), there are 1 266 dams in Africa. Based on the same statistics, this is only approximately 5% of the global total number of the reported large dams. It has also been reported that this continent has high potential for hydropower development. For example, the Democratic Republic of Congo is considered to have the technically feasible hydropower potential of 774 000 GWh/year, but only its 7.5% has already been exploited. In Kenya, there is 4 710 GWh/year of technically feasible hydropower potential, but only 62% of it has been developed. 80% of Kenya's electricity supply comes from hydropower generation. I note that there are planned dams in Kenya, and their feasibilities and impacts are being examined.
It must also be noted that approximately 70% of Africa's dams are commissioned for the purpose of irrigation alone or together with other purposes.

It is a matter of concern that most of irrigation water disappears in the process of its transfer, due to poor irrigation schemes. This makes efficient and integrated water resource development difficult.

In the coming decades, water scarcity is forecasted in various parts of the world, and inefficient use of water in one sector may result in water scarcity in other sectors. Taking into account the growing speed of urbanisation in Africa, the supply of water for urban population may become a problem area if the inefficient use of irrigation water continues.

From this perspective, the joint project between the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements and UNEP, again funded by the Turner Foundation, focuses on water demand management in large cities in Africa.

Looking at Middle East region, the ICOLD statistics indicates that this region has 168 large dams. Of them, 55.8% has been commissioned for the purpose of irrigation alone together with other purposes. This region is characterised by freshwater competition among various sectors and in some cases among the countries. Therefore water use issues particularly associated with dams should be carefully examined.

For both Africa and the Middle East, social and economic development requires varying volumes of water and energy. These requirements depend largely on various factors in the natural systems - hydrological, ecological and geochemical - and human activities like agriculture and industrial development.

This consultation process engineered by the World Commission on Dams intends to present a clearer picture of the interlinking factors while trying to realise the requirements for water, energy and the
environment. UNEP wishes to contribute to this process from the environmental perspective. This regional forum is particularly important, because it is a forum of direct dialogue between the people in the regions and the commissioners for the WCD.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I wish you all very fruitful discussion.