Water Biotech: Biotechnology for a better African water sources

Biotechnology applied in the treatment of polluted water resources can play an important role in addressing the challenge of water scarcity in developing countries. Biotechnological methods are governed by plants or micro-organisms which can detoxify contaminants in water, soils, sediment, and sludge. This allows society to reclaim their resource value. However, many applications of biotechnology have not yet delivered practical solutions due mainly to the lack of information about the benefits of these technologies as well as the lack of dissemination of solutions adapted to local circumstances. WATERBIOTECH is an initiative that will contribute to cope with water scarcity in Africa by providing access to relevant stakeholders in Western, Eastern and Northern Africa to know-how in biotechnologies, good practices and management solutions adapted to their local conditions for the sustainable management of polluted water resources. The targeted countries of the present Coordination Action will be Algeria, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Libya Morocco, Senegal, Swaziland and Tunisia. WATERBIOTECH, by including key actors in the consortium, builds on the results and outcomes of the EU FP6 projects NETSSAF, ROSA, PROMEMBRANE, PURATREAT and CYCLER SUPPORT, carried out in Northern Africa, Sub Saharan and Eastern Africa. The idea is to disseminate best practices jointly with all the requirements and the strategy necessary for the implementation of selected biotechnologies specifically assigned to local regions within the targeted countries.