Apr 10 – Invitation: Public Comment on Draft Guide to Responsible Business Engagement with Water Policy
Background
In 2007, the UN Secretary-General, in partnership with international business leaders and under the auspices of the UN Global Compact, launched the CEO Water Mandate – an initiative established to better understand and advance water stewardship in the private sector. At the Mandate’s 3rd Working Conference, held in Istanbul in March 2009 at the Fifth World Water Forum, Mandate endorsers and key stakeholders held a facilitated dialogue to better understanding the Mandate’s “Public Policy” element. At this meeting, in recognition of widespread confusion by companies and stakeholder concern on this topic, the Mandate decided to develop a best practice guidance on business engagement with water policy. This Guide has now been in development since October 2009 in collaboration with WWF – International and the Mandate’s Policy Engagement Working Group.
Objectives
This Guide ultimately aims to provide principles, concepts, practical steps, and case examples that can facilitate companies’ responsible engagement with water policy in a manner that reduces business risks while advancing established policy goals and positively impacting nearby communities and ecosystems. In doing this, the Guide will:
- Define and explore components of public water policy and the ways businesses interface with them;
- Discuss the types of water-related business risks and the way they can be mitigated through policy engagement;
- Elucidate the various spheres of engagement, operational dimensions, and entry points for engagement at various scales of water policy; and
- Identify principles and good practices/approaches;
- Highlight potential pitfalls to avoid.
Workplan
As part of the CEO Water Mandate Secretariat and as the lead entity developing the Guide, the Pacific Institute is now soliciting comments from all interested stakeholders on the first full draft of the Guide. The purpose of this public comment period is to better incorporate the array of perspectives and needs into the Guide, as well as to maximize its ability to help advance sustainable water management, and in so doing reduce water-related business risks. We invite interested parties to provide input at this stage in the Guide’s development, and ask that comments be submitted by 7 May 2010 at the latest to: PolicyEngagementGuide@pacinst.org. We ask those providing comment to indicate which stakeholder categorization (below) best describes your organization’s (or individual) perspective:
- Government
- Industry
- Civil society/NGO
- Labor
- Academia
- Consultancy
- Personal view / No affiliation
Please also identify the organizational (or individual) geographic perspective, using one of the following categories:
- “Developing” country / Emerging economy / Global South
- Industrialized country
- Global
- Not applicable
During this month-long public comment period, this draft of the Guide will also be discussed at the Mandate’s 5th Working Conference in New York by Mandate endorsers and key stakeholders. The Mandate Secretariat will use these comments to inform the final version of the Guide, which will be released in June 2010.
Contacts
Jason Morrison
Program Director
Pacific Institute
jmorrison@pacinst.org
Gavin Power
Deputy Director
UN Global Compact
powerg@un.org
