Canadian Water Network (CWN) is unveiling a new strategic plan, Building Communities of the Future Through Water, for 2022-2027. The plan focuses on enabling water leaders to be central to achieving community goals through cross-sector collaboration aligned around water.

Canada and the world are experiencing and managing the impacts of major challenges like the global pandemic, climate change, shifting population distribution, and declines in biodiversity and ecosystem health. The actions we take now are critical for our present and our future.

Water organizations have an integral role in addressing these challenges. While water organizations have a visible impact on their communities, their function as anchor organizations tends to remain invisible. As we celebrate World Water Day 2022 and consider this year’s theme, Groundwater – Making the Invisible Visible, let’s embrace this concept and extend it more broadly to how we can recognize the positive and highly visible impact water issues have in our communities.

Setting a near-term course toward a better future

Our conversations with stakeholders across the water sector and beyond reveal that communities want a resilient, equitable and healthy future. CWN’s strategic plan uses this desired future to frame our work of enabling Canada’s water leaders to be at the heart of forging pathways for community success.

CWN has set three strategic goals to guide our efforts and measure our progress:

Strategic Goal #1 – Water organizations as anchors

Water organizations are recognized as anchors for community building, leading to more effective prioritization of actions and investments.

Strategic Goal #2 – Engagement of allies

Water leaders are increasingly engaged with key allies across and beyond the water sector to work toward resilience, equity and health.

Strategic Goal #3 – Connecting around co-benefits and risk

Co-benefits and shared risks are core to connecting sectors for impact, informing actions and investments that involve water.

Implementing the strategy

Over the next five years, CWN will undertake a range of initiatives guided by the three strategic goals. Our activities will clarify possibilities for progress through water, connect people and knowledge to advance shared goals, curate relevant knowledge to inform real-world decision-making, and convene structured discussions that move communities forward.

As communities continue to face uncertainty and change, CWN’s strategic plan for 2022-2027, Building Communities of the Future Through Water, sets a near-term course for our work toward a resilient, equitable and healthy future.