Revision of the Water JPI SRIA & Vision: consultative workshop for Governing Board and Advisory Board members - Berlin, Germany, 22 May 2019

The EPA (Ireland) led a consultative workshop in Berlin on 22nd May 2019 for the members of the Water JPI Governing Board, Scientific Advisory Group and Scientific and Technological Board . There were 34 participants representing 19 countries and the aim of the workshop was to collect feedback and recommendations from the group regarding the new Water JPI Vision 2030 and the structure of the next Strategic Research Innovation Agenda (SRIA). Session one included a presentation by Noreen Layden (EPA) where she provided an overview of the SRIA consultation process completed to date. This included a review of the recommendations and resolutions from previous Governing Board ad Advisory Board meetings and a summary of the joint meeting between Water JPI and FACCE-JPI (Bonn, 2017). The latter sought to identify potential synergies between both SRIAs.  She also provided an update on the public consultation process that included some preliminary results from the online survey and the key messages from the National Consultation Workshops. The Governing Board and Advisory Board were asked to review and comment on the list of Foresight documents to ensure the EPA had a full list of relevant documentation.

Session two was composed of three breakout discussion groups where each group was asked to respond to four key questions: (1) Vision 2030:  What is the Grand Challenge?; (2) Vision 2030: Devising SMART Indicators; (3) SRIA 3.0: Identify the key scientific Themes and (4) Recommendations for semi-structured interviews.  There was a lively discussion between the groups/ participants that culminated in agreement on a draft Vision and new themes that were presented to the Governing Board for consideration at their meeting the next day. The participants were also asked to identify potential candidates for the forthcoming semi-structured interviews. The latter will target sectors and regions that were under represented by the online survey and/or national workshops. The EPA will follow-up with participants in June to identify the candidates and arrange the interviews. EPA Ireland requested assistance from the Governing Board and Advisory Board  should they encounter any translation/ language challenges.