European Water Partnership
Committed to the Water Vision for Europe by initiating, supporting and enhancing initiatives and projects, giving water a common voice in Europe.
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EWS standard development

HomeActivitiesEuropean Water StewardshipEuropean Water Stewardship standardEWS standard development


EWS standard development process

 timeline standard development+resize

From November 2008 until February 2010, the first draft of the European Water Stewardship standard was developed in a multi- stakeholder process coordinated by the European Water Partnership (EWP) which included external experts and partners from business, agriculture, civil society and European authorities.


Working groups

Working groups from different private sectors – namely industry, agriculture, golf and urban areas – were established to define a list of sector-specific criteria and indicators for sustainable water management against which to perform an assessment of the water user. 

Each working group consists of representatives from regional or local organisations, associations or governments. They engaged to test the developed indicators on-site to evaluate their applicability.

 A steering committee was also created to supervise and provide guidance on strategic questions of the European Water Stewardship.


Pilot Testing

To design it as a pragmatic tool, its applicability is tested on industrial production sites and at farms.


Public Consultation

According to the requirements of the Code of Good Practice for Setting Social and Environmental Standards of the ISEAL Alliance, EWP submitted the EWS standard to two rounds of 60-days public consultation to provide all stakeholders the opportunity to reflect on format and content of the EWS standard and the referring glossary document.

 
EWS Launch

The 24th of November 2011 the EWS was officially launched.

 

Timeline of the EWS standard development process:

Technical Workshop09.10.2009Open space discussion and review of the PCI set of Indicators.
1st version of the Water Stewardship standard01.11.2008 – 08.03.2010Developed based on inputs stakeholders and Working Groups
Milestone Event31.05.2010Launch event of the first draft Water Stewardship standard:Open exchange on drawbacks and opportunities of Water Stewardship in agriculture, industry and urban areas.
Pilot Studies 1st round12.03.2010 – 21.10.2010First pilot studies testing the Water Stewardship standard on-site
1st Public consultation 12.07.2010 – 20.09.2010On-line public consultation of the Water Stewardship standard v1.0.More than 100 comments were received.
2nd version of Water Stewardship standard09.11.2010Amended version based on inputs pilot studies and public consultation.
Pilot Studies 2nd round01.01.2011 – 31.05.2011Pilot studies were performed to test the applicability of the Water Stewardship Standard.
3rd version of Water Stewardship standard01.02.2011 – 31.05.2011Input mainly from EWS partner Control Union Certifications.
4th version of Water Stewardship standard01.08.2011 – 31.08.2011- Change name of EWP Water Stewardship standard to European Water Stewardship (EWS) standard.- Editorial amendment of standard document based on inputs pilot studies.
2nd Public consultation 07.09.2011 – 07.11.2011On-line public consultation of the EWS standard v.4.5.
Development of EWS group and multi-site standard  
EWS Launch event24.11.2011Launch of European Water Stewardship (EWS): flagship event for sustainable water users in agriculture and industry
3rd round of pilot studies08.12.2011- Testing applicability of EWS Standard in new sectors- Testing applicability of EWS Group standard on SMEs.
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