The Last Drop: A 2030 Backcasting Policy Lab for Regional Hydro-Resilience

​It’s 2030, and the world has missed SDG 6. Millions still lack safe water and sanitation, aquifers are running dry, and drought is pushing people out of their homes. What should we have done in 2026?

​The Last Drop is a 75-minute policy lab built around that question. Instead of another panel, we’ll run a back-casting exercise: start from a simulated failure and trace it back to the decisions that should've been made today.

​How it works

​We open with four short regional briefings, each looking at a different part of the water challenge:

• ​GCC: financing desalination

• ​Mashreq & Levant: cooperation on shared rivers and aquifers

• ​Maghreb: drought and the migration it drives

• ​East Africa & South Asia: closing the WASH investment gap

​Next, youth presenters and institutional respondents split into working groups to turn those realities into concrete policy commitments for 2026. We close by signing Commitment Cards linked to the UN Water Action Agenda, so the conversation ends with something people have actually agreed to.

​Who’s in the room
Young policy leaders, practitioners, and decision-makers working on water, climate, and development. We’re currently confirming high-level participation from regional UN entities and government water and climate ministries.

​What you’ll leave with
A set of 2026 policy commitments shaped by people from four very different water realities, and a signed pledge that connects your work to the Water Action Agenda. Each one is a small, specific step that moves us away from the 2030 we started with.

​Seats in the working groups are limited. Early registration is recommended to secure a place.