This project is about livelihoods, and how they can be improved through reservoir management for multiple uses and users.It is about developing strategies for optimizing the benefits of WSI and increasing the ways in which water can be utilized for the benefit of the poor.

Land use and land cover change is driven by human actions and also drives changes that limit availability of products and services for human and livestock, and it can undermine environmental health as well. Therefore, this study was aimed at understanding land use and land cover change in Lenche Dima and Kuhar Michael of Amhara region, Ethiopia. Time-series satellite images that included Landsat MSS, TM, ETM+ and ASTER, which covered the time frame between 1972/3 to 2005, were used.

The Mekong Basin Focal Project aims were to assess water use, water productivity and

water poverty in the basin, and analyse the opportunities and risks of change in water

management that influences water poverty.

The main issue facing the Lower Mekong is not water availability (except for seasonally in

certain areas such as northeast Thailand) but the impact of changed flows (which may

result from dam or irrigation development or climate change) on ecology, fish production,

“The Strategic Analysis of India’s National River Linking Project”: In 2005, the

International Water Management Institute (IWMI) and the Challenge Program on Water

and Food (CPWF) started a three-year research study on “Strategic Analysis of India’s River Linking Project”. The primary focus of the IWMI-CPWF project is to provide the public and the policy planners with a balanced analysis of the social benefits and costs ofthe National River Linking Project (NRLP).

The project consists of research in three phases. Phase I analyzed India’s water future

The Sustaining inclusive Collective Action that Links across Economic and Ecological Scales in upper watersheds (Scales) project fits mainly in People and Water in Catchments Theme (Theme

2) of the CPWF. Its goal is to contribute to poverty alleviation in the upper watersheds of the

tropics through improved collective action for watershed resource management within and across

social-spatial scales. Scales worked though an integrated program of collaborative action

research, development, and capacity building in key catchments of the Nile and Andes basins, as

Agricultural production in Ethiopia is characterised by subsistence orientation, low productivity, low level of technology and inputs, lack of infrastructures and market institutions, and extremely vulnerable to rainfall variability. It has a rapidly increasing population currently close to 74 million and yet about 39 percent of the population lives on absolute poverty of less than a $1 a day poverty line while close to 80 percent falls below US $2 a day poverty line.

The Country Environmental Analysis (CEA) for Timor-Leste identifies environmental priorities through a systematic review of environmental issues in natural resources management and environmental health in the context of the country's economic development and environmental institutions. Lack of data has been the main limitation in presenting a more rigorous analysis. Nevertheless, the report builds on the best available secondary data, presents new data on the country's wealth composition, and derives new results on the costs of water and air pollution.

This project is about showing whether BSM are effective. It seeks to quantify the consequences of BSM-driven changes in land and water management for livelihoods in upstream rural communities, and for water supplies for downstream water consumers. It will develop methods to anticipate ex ante the likely consequences of introducing BSM as well as monitoring and measuring these consequences ex post.

This project is about assessing the value of water in its various uses.It includes an assessment of water needs for major water uses and features the application of quantitative and qualitative valuation techniques to estimate costs and benefits associated with different water management strategies and scenarios.

Water valuation means expressing the value of water-related goods and services so as to inform sharing and allocation decisions.It features quantitative and qualitative approaches and considers relationships between interconnected and interdependent water uses.

The CPWF-supported project ‘Models for implementing multiple-use water supply

systems for enhanced land and water productivity, rural livelihoods and gender equity’

(‘CPWF-MUS’) innovated, tested, and documented homestead-scale and communityscale

models for Multiple Use water Services in 30 rural and peri-urban sites in 8

countries: the Andes (Bolivia and Colombia), Indus-Ganges (India, Nepal), Limpopo

(South Africa and Zimbabwe), Mekong (Thailand) and Nile (Ethiopia). Learning alliances

The year of 2008 marked the beginning of a new phase at ICARDA: the full implementation of the Center's Strategic Plan 2007-2016, and a renewed commitment to addressing the global challenges of food security, poverty alleviation and climate change in the dry areas. It was also a year of adversity, both locally and globally. At ICARDA's main research station in Syria, the 2007/2008 cropping season experienced drought combined with wide variations in temperature, falling to -12°C in winter and rising to 37°C in the early spring.