They said the WARPO deserves to be strengthened to act as the 'Clearing House' for all water sector projects.

The national dialogue on 'Developing coordination mechanism and strengthening apex body in the water sector in Bangladesh' was jointly organised by Bangladesh Water Partnership (BWP) and WARPO in the city on Wednesday, says a press release.

A keynote paper on 'Integrated water resources management' was presented at the dialogue by WARPO Director General M Inamul Haque.

In his paper, Haque pointed out that water resources management in Bangladesh has many diverse problems and issues.

The most critical of these are alternating flood and water scarcity during the wet and the dry seasons, ever expanding water needs of a growing economy and population, and massive river sedimentation and bank erosion, he added.

CEIGIS Executive Director Giasuddin Ahmed Chowdhury presented the other paper on 'Capacity building of water sector institutions in Bangladesh.'

In his paper, Chowdhury categorically underscored the need to recognise WARPO as apex body in water sector for macro-planning.

Additional Director General of Bangladesh Water Development Board Engineer Md Amir Khosru highlighted the inadequate size and capacity of WARPO to carryout its mandated function.

Chaired and moderated by BWP President Quamrul Islam Siddique, the dialogue was also participated by eminent personalities like Prof Asif Nazrul of law department at Dhaka University, Country Representative of IUCN-Bangladesh Dr Ainun Nishat, BWP Vice-president Ambassador Muhammad Zamir, Programme Manager of Poverty Group at UNDP Shaila Khan, Senior Specialist of World Bank K Minnatullah, Zahiruddin Ahmed of Asian Development Bank, JICA Expert Susumu Sugatani, Paul Edwards of Unicef, SM Rafiquzzaman of World Bank and TEC Member Harmul Bruhl of GWP .