The first global AWS forum was a great opportunity to evaluate the progress of the system and the AWS International Water Stewardship Standard and identify opportunities and challenges in the future. GSI is currently contributing its experience and knowledge for the implementation and promotion of the standard in Europe and Spain and also participated actively.

En junio de 2018, la finca de cítricos Iberesparragal, en España, logró la primera certificación nivel oro según el estándar AWS en Europa y una de las primeras en el sector agrícola en todo el mundo. Como componente del proyecto de GSI con la  Alliance for Water Stewardship, apoyamos todo el proceso de implementación en Iberesparragal mediante la aplicación del enfoque WaterData4Action. El resultado es un estudio de caso práctico del cual se pueden extraer diferentes logros y aprendizajes.

We collaborated with Helvetas Swiss Intercooperation for estimating blue water productivities for three cotton farms in Tajikistan using the Geographic Agricultural Water Footprint Calculator GAWFC. We did this for two soil water retention capacity scenarios. We found out that the crop suffers water stress especially during the months of July and August, which are the hottest months. However, crop water stress is alleviated for the bigger soil water retention capacity, indicating that efforts to increase the water retention capacity of the soil are very relevant for these farms, ultimately helping to increase yields.

In June 2018, the citrus farm Iberesparragal, in Spain, achieved the first gold certification under the AWS standard in Europe and one of the first ones in the agricultural sector worldwide.

As a component of GSI's project with the Alliance for Water Stewardship, we supported the whole implementation process at Iberesparragal by applying the WaterData4Action approach. The result is a practical case study from which different achievements and learnings can be extracted.