https://worldwaterweek.org/programme/theme
Water for People and Progress
World Water Week 2026, 23-27 August.
Water security and safely managed drinking water and sanitation are essential for human development, health, and resilience. They enable individuals to thrive and contribute to stronger, more stable communities, particularly benefiting marginalized groups such as people living in poverty, ethnic minorities, Indigenous Peoples, migrants, women, and children. Despite their importance, billions still lack access to these services. While much has been learned about reaching those most in need, significant injustice and inequity persist. Addressing this gap is both urgent and immense. Climate change is intensifying the challenge, with evidence showing it is progressing faster than expected—raising temperatures, altering precipitation, and increasing disasters. These shifts further threaten ecosystems and human well-being.
As organizer of World Water Week, SIWI emphasizes the shared responsibility of all stakeholders, especially of governments and leaders, to prioritize the needs of the most vulnerable. In this context, water professionals have a vital role in advancing sustainable, just, and equitable development while raising awareness and addressing the complex impacts of climate change. Their work is central to safeguarding water security for current and future generations.
World Water Week 2026 will progress towards a more just and equitable water secure future for all people and better care for our home planet, all set against the backdrop of climate change. At World Water Week we will recognize and support women’s rights and responsibilities relating to water, appreciate and learn from Indigenous science and knowledge, and share knowledge and learning between generations.
The sessions at World Water Week 2026 will discuss progress on water for people in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and look ahead to the successors to the SDGs. They will build on the work on equity at the 2023 UN Water Conference and contribute towards the work on this issue for the 2026 UN Water Conference.
The scope of World Water Week 2026 will centre on the topics most relevant to equitable human development in a changing climate. These topics reflect the pressing need to address persistent inequalities, as well as the compounding effects of climate change on already vulnerable populations. The thematic scope also draws from the six interactive dialogue themes of the 2026 UN Water Conference: Water for people; Water for prosperity; Water for planet; Water for cooperation; Water in multilateral processes; and Investments for water.
Aligning with the 2026 World Water Day and the World Water Development Report, water and gender will be a prominent focus. In addressing the unequal treatment of women and girls throughout the governance and provision of water services, we aim to go beyond inclusion towards genuine transformation.
In addition, the Week will give special attention to Indigenous Peoples, whose traditional knowledge systems offer invaluable insights into sustainable water management that benefits communities and ecosystems. Indigenous communities are often the most deeply affected by both social inequalities and climate change, yet they remain among the least represented. Their voices and expertise will be recognized as essential to the future of equitable water governance.
Climate change is also reshaping human mobility, increasing the number of displaced people, migrants, and refugees around the world, many of whom move not only to escape environmental and economic hardship but also in search of safety, better livelihoods, and improved access to services. World Water Week 2026 will address the urgent question of how to ensure that these individuals—and the host communities who support them—have fair and sustained access to safe water and sanitation. Linked to this is the need to examine how water can be allocated equitably at the local and household levels so that people can use it for their major priorities, for example, for food, for nutrition and for health.
The programme will also explore how to address climate change mitigation and adaptation to ensure water, peace, and security in a polarizing world, and how to manage water for human development within planetary boundaries.
Another central discussion will focus on how to measure whether work for human development truly delivers equitable outcomes. Metrics related to gender, Indigenous knowledge, and other aspects will be identified and developed, helping to address systemic inequalities and to hold decision-makers accountable for the distribution of their benefits.
Finally, as flows of development aid shift, World Water Week will consider how these changes affect the world’s poorest and most marginalized people. As climate change intensifies vulnerability, it is more important than ever to explore how financial resources can be mobilized and directed towards those most in need. Discussions will include strategies for securing new resources and designing more equitable financing flows.
In a complex and fast-moving world, SIWI offers World Water Week as a setting for people to meet, discuss, debate, coordinate and move ahead; an inclusive place of hope and positive thinking; and a safe space that empowers underrepresented voices to be heard and contribute to the discussions. World Water Week sessions have a positive tone and a strong orientation towards actions and commitments.
Each World Water Week comprises a wide variety of sessions ranging from specialist scientific discussions to broad public policy debates. To create a structured and collective sense of purpose for all those sessions, SIWI concentrates each Week on a particular theme, selected both to set and to reflect the global agenda. The Week is designed to raise awareness of the theme, to advance the debate, to reach new consensus, and to learn from other sectors.
In the build-up to the 2026 UN Water Conference, SIWI offers World Water Week as a platform to help people prepare and achieve their aims ahead of this crucial water governance process. Highlighting its significance, the UN has recognized World Water Week as a “key global milestone” on the road to the 2026 UN Water Conference.
To maximize its contribution to global governance of water, World Water Week 2026 will link, in ways that are currently being developed, with other important global processes such as the UNFCCC, UNCBD, UNCCD and UN Ocean Conference. It will also contribute to other processes related to the SDGs and their successors, and to other global and regional processes relevant to water equity and climate.
The SIWI Seminars are significant elements of World Water Week, designed to enable evidence-based policy debates on urgent and important topics. Collectively, their topics will span most of the scope of the Week.
All the SIWI Seminars will study actions together with the financing, governance and policies needed to enable those actions. They will generate conclusions, commitments and recommendations. The discussions will benefit from the knowledge and wisdom of Indigenous Peoples, of women, of young people, and of other groups underrepresented by current geopolitical power structures.