Building more effective partnerships for innovation in urban water management

The Sustainable Water Management Improves Tomorrows Cities Health (SWITCH) project is a major research partnership funded by the EC with a budget exceeding €20 million. SWITCH is undertaking innovation in the area of integrated urban water management (IUWM). The project aims to carry out action-orientated research in cities that is more demand-led and achieves greater lasting impact. Rather than solely focusing on new research, the project is encouraging multi-stakeholder, learning alliances to help set the research agenda, to put research across different aspects of the urban water cycle into use in cities, and to help improve integration and scaling-up impacts.This paper reviews the experiences gained by the SWITCH consortium (of 33 partners) in grappling with stakeholder engagement in this complex research area and the achievements to date. Following a consideration of the rationale and basis for adopting a learning alliance approach, the paper is structured around a number of key methodologies these platforms have utilised. The paper aims to provide examples of outcomes and lessons learnt that may be relevant for other similar initiatives.