Dear Friends of NBCBN,
The Nile is the longest river on earth. Although one would expect that countries and people sharing the same river would collaborate as much as possible to jointly use the precious resources in a sustainable and equitable way and to preserve the life all its riparians, history has shown the opposite.As pressure on the Nile resources is becoming increasingly manifest there is a growing overall consensus: it's time for a change. Good initiatives and steps have already been taken. But how can we contribute to accelerate this process?
Networks have increasingly shown to have the potential for change and innovation. Networks are as old as humanity. Without networks we wouldn’t have survived as human beings. Without sharing knowledge and without communication, the wheel would never have been invented, salt and silk would not have been shipped around the world, and we wouldn’t have learned how to read or write. Networks have always made the world a little smaller.
These thoughts came up when I was reading the stories of the many people that have witnessed the emergence of the NBCBN network and have contributed to the content of this valuable booklet. It clearly shows that NBCBN has changed the life, behavior and capacity of people. NBCBN has reduced the distance between people living and working in the Nile basin countries.
The network has been facilitating the interaction among water professionals that understand that only through collaboration, friendship and trust the life of the ever increasing population in all its riparian countries can be sustained. Therefore, NBCBN is above all: "a network of people". People that have learned and experienced that "knowledge sharing" generates the power to cope with today's challenges. This booklet is the very proof of it.
I hope that this collection of warm and memorable stories will also encourage you to join the NBCBN family and to contribute to further increase the value of our network. I also hope that the stories are read by decision makers in and around the Nile basin and will be convinced of the potential of this network to build the capacity to solve the problems they are facing nowadays. NBCBN has made the Nile basin smaller. Worth cherishing, nurturing and..... not to forget....supporting it!
Thanks to Amel, our Network Manager, and her dedicated team to take the initiative to collect and publish these stories of 10 years NBCBN.
I wish you as much pleasure as I had reading: "what they said about NBCBN".
November 2010
From NBCBN Booklet “what they said about NBCBN”, Published in November 2010