Newsletter October 2020

The Management Board meeting was held virtually on 30 September 2020. This meeting gathered the Water JPI Chair, Maurice Héral (ANR, FR), vice-Chair, Miguel-Angel Gilarranz (AEI, ES), leaders of Water JPI Task Forces on Alignment and on Interactions with Horizon Europe, as well as the coordinators of EC supporting projects WaterWorks2014, WaterWorks2015, WaterWorks2017 and IC4WATER. This meeting aimed at preparing the upcoming Governing Board meeting scheduled on 4 November 2020. It was the opportunity to introduce the new Coordination and Secretariat team who is ensuring support to executive body members. Moreover, Water JPI partners responsible for the Water4SDGs Knowledge Hub and the development of a business model for Public Private Partnership were invited to give an overview of the progress done and next steps.

The 11^th Advisory Boards meeting was organised on the 2^nd of October 2020 and was the occasion to enhance the involvement of our Boards in Water JPI activities. 35 attendees participated in the meeting, including nine members of the Scientific and Technological Board and eight representatives of the Stakeholders Advisory Group. The preparation of the European partnership Water4All - Water Security for the Planet - under Horizon Europe and the design of its Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA) were the key topics of the Workshop.

The Water4All initiative aims at enabling water security for all on the long term. The partnership will be based on a SRIA, shared between the partners involved in Water4All and the relevant stakeholders (e.g. Water JPI SRIA 2025, EurAqua SRIA, EurEau priorities, FACCE-JPI new SRA, and Water Europe SIRA). Advisory Boards members were invited to provide their views on a number of relevant issues for the design of the Water4All SRIA:  (i) Key RDI needs, (ii) key performance indicators (KPIs) of the initiative, and (iii) exchange on the roadmap and procedure for the Water4All SRIA development.

To ensure complementarity and synergies with other Partnerships and with activities in Horizon Europe Work Programme and relevant Missions, a public consultation and interviews to gather stakeholders feedback on RDI needs and priorities for the Water4All SRIA will be launched later on this year or beginning 2021.

After six years of strong commitment, Dominique Darmendrail is leaving the French National Research Agency (ANR) and the Water JPI Coordination.  She will return to the French Geological Survey (BRGM), as Director of Water and Global Changes Programme. On behalf of her dear friends and colleagues in the Water JPI, and especially the Secretariat team, we would like to THANK YOU for all you have done.

Dominique was instrumental in the success of the Water JPI and beyond. Her tremendous work and dedication over the years contributed to the implementation of Water JPI activities, which are crucial for progressing towards key water challenges. She tirelessly supported our joint effort to build a strong water research and innovation partnership. Thanks to her commitment and enthusiasm, she also contributed to the Water4All partnership development, while ensuring a smooth connection with the Water JPI.

Dominique, it is a great gift to be able to influence thinking and motivate people from a wide variety of backgrounds, and to contribute to achieving so important goals.

Dominique: you will be truly missed. We will miss your deep knowledge and foremost, your kindness. We wish you the best of luck in your new adventure, happiness and good health!

Esther Díez Cebollero joined the French National Research Agency (ANR) in September 2020, reinforcing the Water JPI Secretariat team as scientific officer.

Before joining the ANR, Esther worked as European Policy Officer for the National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food and Environment (INRAE) for over 9 years and she has occupied different research positions in universities from Spain, The Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Her areas of expertise include European Policy, Water Resource Management (stakeholder participation, social learning for adaptive management, and decision support tools for policy making) and Land Degradation.

Esther has been collaborating with the Water JPI since the first stages. She was strongly involved in the development of the Water JPI Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA), and its update in 2016 in the frame of the WatEUr CSA. Since June 2014, she is also involved in the Water JPI’s Task Force on “Interaction with Horizon 2020 – Horizon Europe”, having contributed to the drafting of position papers and strategic notes. In addition, as member of the French national research Alliance for the Environment – AllEnvi, she provided technical support to the former coordinator of the Water JPI, Dominique Darmendrail.

Welcome on board Esther!

BiodivERsA and Water JPI are pleased to announce that their transnational 2020-2021 Joint Call on “Conservation and restoration of degraded ecosystems and their biodiversity, including a focus on aquatic systems” is now open.

This call will cover the following three non-exclusive themes:

• Studying the biological and biophysical processes at stake for conservation/restoration, and their interactions
• Assessing trade-offs and synergies between targets, benefits and policies for conservation and restoration
• Knowledge for improving the effectiveness and upscaling of conservation and restoration actions

This joint call includes a focus on freshwater aquatic systems but all environments (i.e. terrestrial, freshwater and marine) are eligible.

31 funding organisations from 27 countries joined forces and have reserved – together with the European Commission – a total amount of over 20 Million Euro. The most updated list of participating countries is available on the Call webpages.

Make sure to consult the complete Call Announcement and all supporting documents, as well as Funding Organisation Rules available on the call webpages.

Call Timeline:

A two-step process will apply, with a mandatory submission of pre-proposals at the first step and submission of full proposals at the second step, via an Electronic Proposal Submission System (EPSS). The link to the EPSS will be available soon on the BiodivERsA and Water JPI websites.

• Launch of the call: Monday 5 October 2020
• Deadline for pre-proposals submission (mandatory): Monday 7 December 2020, 16:00 CET (local time in Brussels)

Please note that the nature of the evaluation at the first step (pre-proposals stage) will depend on the number of pre-proposals received:

• If a very large number of pre-proposals is received, a first scientific evaluation of pre-proposals will be organized and the deadline to submit full proposals will be the 3 May 2021.
• Otherwise, only an eligibility check of pre-proposals will be performed and the deadline to submit full proposals will be the 15 March 2021*.

* The actual deadline to submit full proposals will be communicated by the end of December 2020.

For more information visit the BiodivERsA website and the Water JPI website.

The pre-proposals responded to the joint call for projects on risks posed to human health and the environment by pollutants and pathogens present in the water resources launched by the three Joint Programming Initiatives (JPIs) on Water, Oceans and Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) in collaboration with the European Commission under the framework of the AquaticPollutants Cofund

The evaluation and selection of the pre-proposals included an eligibility check of the pre-proposals and a scientific evaluation performed by external reviewers. After the evaluation, the Call Steering Committee selected, on September 30^th 2020, 53 projects pre-proposals to proceed to the second tep in the process: the submission of a full proposal.  The selection was aimed at retaining the maximum number of projects, based on the quality of the pre-proposal and taking into account the available funding.

The coordinators of the pre-proposals will be notified of the results of Phase I and the applicants of the selected projects will be invited to the full proposal submission platform.