Dear colleagues,

As members of the Africa Biodiversity Collaborative Group (ABCG), we at Conservation International and Africa Wildlife Foundation would like to extend an invitation to all practitioners working on water-related issues and interested in integrated development to join the ABCG Freshwater Conservation and Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (FW-WASH) online Community of Practice (CoP).

ABCG's mission is to tackle complex and changing conservation challenges by catalyzing and strengthening collaboration. We do this by advancing understanding of critical biodiversity conservation challenges and their solutions in sub-Saharan Africa. Over the past five years, through its thematic working group, Global Health Linkages to Biodiversity Conservation, ABCG members have focused on understanding the linkages between global health and biodiversity, particularly the integration of freshwater conservation and WASH efforts in sub-Saharan Africa. The main goal of the WASH component is to generate knowledge on the impacts of infrastructure developments on watersheds in Sub-Saharan Africa, as well as the impacts of freshwater conservation in meeting WASH goals. By linking freshwater conservation and WASH, ABCG expects reduced watershed degradation and pollution will improve the health of freshwater ecosystems.

As a result of consultations from FW-WASH practitioners in an inaugural workshop held in 2014, ABCG set out to explore the creation of a CoP as a collaborative space where global health and conservation professionals can share knowledge, learn, and solve issues together. With this in mind, the objectives of this group are to enable FW-WASH practitioners to connect and organize around common issues while providing a platform for sharing resources and supporting integrated learning.

To join this group and contribute to the discussions, please visit LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/groups/8586958.