evaluation of the study visit - Mekong River Commission

1 INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND
MRC Study Visit to the Danube River Basin 2012
The Basin Development Programme (BDP) 2011-2015 is designed to facilitate and support
implementation of the Basin Development Strategy for the Lower Mekong River Basin. The 2012
work plan includes a Study Visit to the Danube Basin for ‘technical middle managers’ involved in the
regional implementation of the BDP Strategy.
The Study Visit to the Danube River Basin took place 24 March – 3 April 2012 and intended to
complement the 2008 study tour to the Columbia River Basin (US/Canada) for senior Government
officials. The Columbia Basin study tour focused on key issues related to the preparation and
negotiation of the Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) based Basin Development
Strategy.
As mentioned above, the target group for the Danube River Basin Study Visit was ‘technical middle
managers’ with important responsibilities for: 1) the completion and subsequent implementation of
the Basin Action Plan (for the implementation of the IWRM-based Basin Development Strategy) and
2) broadening of the next planning cycle through the preparation of the BDP 2011-2015 Inception
Report.
The total size of the Danube Study Visit group was 21 participants from all four lower Mekong basin
(LMB) countries as well as the Secretariat of the Mekong River Commission. A detailed list of
participants can be found in Annex 4.
2 OBJECTIVES OF THE DANUBE STUDY VISIT
The objective of the Study Visit to the Danube River Basin aimed at learning from basin-wide
planning experiences of the International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River (the
Commission) in support of basin planning in the Mekong Basin. In particular river basin management
aspects applied in the Danube River Basin should support
1) the implementation of the Basin Development Strategy, in particular the priority actions for basin
management such as the development of an environmental baseline and
2) the detailed design of the next stage of basin planning, including a broader set of basin-wide
development scenarios.
3 PROGRAMME SCOPE AND OUTLINE OF LEARNING POINTS
In order to thematically specify the Danube Study Visit and to meet its objectives, the Mekong River
Commission up-front has outlined specific learning points (Annex 1). The learning points guided the
Danube Study Visit per se, the development of a targeted programme as well as the evaluation at the
end of the Study Visit. The overall and detailed programme of the Study Visits can be found in
Annex 2 and Annex 3. The evaluation material is part of Annex 6.
[1]