The project that is funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) is led by ESCWA. It will be responsible for coordinating and managing project implementation and reporting.

ESCWA is also responsible of ensuring that the preparation and implementation of the project outputs are appropriately communicated to the regional initiative partners and associated regional mechanisms.

This Project aims to enhance water and food security under changing climate conditions by informing, advising and facilitating the engagement of national governments, local communities including women and youth in climate action. This will be pursued by enhancing policy coherence across the water and agricultural sectors through institutional mechanisms and the provision of informed policy guidance and risk analysis, expanding the local knowledge base though science-based assessments and analysis of climate impacts on strategic sectors, and empowering diverse communities through applied capacity building initiatives, pilot projects and policy forums to help the Arab region become more water secure, food secure and climate resilient.

In Dec 2015, the Fourth Arab IGF concluded the first mandate of the Arab IGF process (2012-2015) and resulted in the launching by ESCWA and LAS of the AIGF2020 initiative  that aims to analyse and develop the Arab IGF process in its second mandate that could extend until 2020 or 2025.