Sustainable water security towards mutual benefit and win-win
cooperation: Comparative analysis of action plans on implementation of
the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development between the European Union
and China
Abstract
Over the past 100 years, socioeconomic development has been ceaselessly
putting great pressure on our freshwater resources. It has led to
overwhelming and undermining nature’s ability to provide key functions
and services, i.e. growing water scarcity and deterioration of
water-related environment and ecosystems worldwide. The establishment of
the 2030 Agenda’s Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6, therefore not
only articulates the augmented concerns on water sustainability issues
in the global political agenda, but also highlights that all countries
(stakeholders) committed to translating the global goals and targets to
national (own) targets and indicators, along with their individual
challenges and corresponding opportunities of accounting for mutual
benefit and win-win cooperation. The European Union (EU) (developed) and
China (developing), as the second and third largest economies
respectively, have been addressing sustainable development as an
overarching objective for policy-making on the economic, social, and
environmental dimensions, and working accordingly in a balanced and
integrated manner. They have been joining forces, as equal partners, for
better water through the China Europe Water Platform (CEWP) built in
2012, which provides a unique prospective to insight into how the EU and
China have been making unremitting efforts for pursuing water
sustainability, as well as the characteristics of action plans on SDG 6
implementation between the EU and China. The principal aim of this study
is to comprehend (1) the status quo of the EU and China’s progress on
SDG 6 targets, (2) how the EU and China can take forward implementation
in partnership to enable and accelerate progress towards achieving SDG
6, and (3) how the EU and China can go beyond SDG 6 to establish
linkages across the 2030 Agenda in the context of water-energy-food
nexus. The highlights to fill the aforementioned knowledge gaps can be
portrayed as follows: (1) the EU and China could develop a national
indicator system together regarding SDG 6 targets, (2) the EU and China
could establish a national indicator database together, in accordance
with the national indicator system, and (3) the EU and China could
conduct a lesson learned workshop together, in terms of equitable,
participatory, and transparent SDG 6 policy process.