Water Family Meeting and Symposium on Water Equity in South-East Europe and the Mediterranean 28-29 March 2019 Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy) - Marko Ivetić, UNESCO Chairholder, Chair in Water for Ecologically Sustainable Development, Serbia

1. UNESCO Chair in Water for
Ecologically Sustainable Development
www.grf.bg.ac.rs
Prof. Marko Ivetić
University of
Belgrade
Serbia
UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)

2. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Presentation overview
o Tradition
o Introduction
o Education: EDUCATE!, from 2007 - 2016
o Education: Summer School: University of Belgrade -
SIBSTRIN, Novosibirsk, Russia, from 2016 -
o Research/Doctoral Studies
o Main Partners
o New Research Projects
o Concluding Remarks

3. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Tradition
1808 Establishment of public higher education in Serbia
1846 Engineering School
1863 Great School (Law, Philosophy, Engineering)
1887 Chair in Hydraulic Engineering
1905 University of Belgrade, Technical School
1948 Faculty of Civil Engineering
1987 IRTCUD - UNESCO Center for Urban Drainage
2012 UNESCO Chair in Water for Ecologically Sustainable
Development

4. Faculty of Civil Engineering University of Belgrade Serbia
UNESCO Chair in Water for
Ecologically Sustainable Development (2012)
UNESCO priorities – UNESCO’s priority to Africa, Central Asia and gender equality
South - South (Serbia and East Africa), Balkan – East (Serbia - Central Asia) and North -
South (Poland, Germany, Norway and Serbia, East Africa) training and knowledge transfer
(with a special focus on capacity building for women).
UNESCO Medium-Term Strategy for 2008-2013
1) ‘Mobilizing Science Knowledge and Policy for Sustainable Development’;
2) ‘Leveraging Scientific Knowledge for the Benefit of the Environment and the
Management of Natural Resources’;
3) ‘Enhancing Research-Policy Linkages on Social Transformations’;
4) ‘Fostering Research on Critical Emerging Ethical and Social Issues’.
Millennium Development Goals
1) ‘Goal 3 Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women’ ;
2) ‘Goal 7 Ensure Environmental Sustainability’ the target to ‘Integrate the principles of
sustainable development into country policies and programmes and reverse the loss of
environmental resources’.

5. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
UNESCO Chair in Water 4ESD
We started our activities with the main intention
to manage the existing study programmes and to develop
the new ones in the field of water.
One of the active and very successful study programme
is EDUCATE!, developed by 4 universities and accredited
in Serbia and in Greece.
As number of students was declining, we shifted to PhD
students with helping them to get state scholarship.
The second part of the presentation will give an overview
of the interesting PhD research projects, completed and
ongoing.

6. Faculty of Civil Engineering University of Belgrade Serbia
EDUCATE
A Postgraduate Programme in Water Resources and Environmental Management
 National Technical University of Athens,
School of Civil Engineering and School of
Chemical Engineering
 University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Civil and
Geodetic Engineering
 Technical University of Civil Engineering,
Bucharest
 University of Belgrade, Faculty of Civil
Engineering

7. Faculty of Civil Engineering University of Belgrade Serbia
EDUCATE
A Postgraduate Programme in Water Resources and Environmental Management
The EDUCATE! programme goal is to:
reverse the flow of trained professionals
leaving the region
increase the region’s participation in project
development (rather than relying exclusively
on outside expertise)
Change the attitude and increase the
capacity to deal with integrated water
resources management
 Initiated within and supported through UNESCO's Reconstruction
of Scientific Cooperation in SEE Programme
 The EDUCATE programme was first launched in 2007 as part of
an INTERREG III B CADSES project

8. Summer School: University of Belgrade - SIBSTRIN,
Novosibirsk, Russia, from 2016 -
During summers 2016/2017/2018, we have tested the
concept, together with UNESCO Chair in water from
SIBSTRIN, and we had a pilot summer school:
• two weeks in Serbia (Risk Analysis and Safety Guided
Design of WSS) and
• two weeks in Novosibirsk (Environmental Safety in
Water Resources Management),
• where students from Incheon Technical University
(Korea) joined the school.
• More candidates to join

9. •• Risk Analysis Methodology in Water Infrastructure Asset Management
 Requirements to explore possible ways to:
o improving functioning of water supply systems in a systemic way
o creating an environment for sustainable application of scientific and
professional work techniques in practice
 The focus and the essence of the dissertation is an attempt to
research perceptions and understanding the problem that is being
addressed
 The first step in solving any problem is to understand the problem
 Fundamental question : ’Who is to blame for pipe failure?’
 Actual concept: WHO Water Safety Plans - multibarrier approach
 Traditional definition of risk:
RISK = PROBABILITY x CONSEQUENCE
 Issues: Risk definition
Aleksandar Šotić (supervised by Marko Ivetić)
(Reason,1997)
• Risk Analysis Methodology in Water
Infrastructure Asset Management

10. UNESCO Chair in Water 4ESD
•
 Paradigm shift
 From RISK (negative, unwanted events)
 To SYSTEM SAFETY (positive, how it should be)
 Water systems as complex, hierarchical, adaptive, resilient
 SOCIO-TECHNICAL context
 Applying System & Control Theory along with Cognitive Engineering
(MMI)
 Basic concept is not an event but the safety constraint
 SAFETY as emergent system property
 Case Study: Vrutci (Užice) reservoir (affected 70.000)
Aleksandar Šotić (supervised by Marko Ivetić)
• Risk Analysis Methodology in Water
Infrastructure Asset Management

11. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Cyanobacteria Bloom in Vrutci Reservoir

12. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Vrutci
Vrutci Reservoir

13. 13
 Urban Surfaces Pollution Buildup and Washoff Modeling
 Experimental catchment, University of Belgrade
URBAN WATER CYCLE

14. 14
 Urban Surfaces Pollution Buildup and
Washoff Modeling
 Development and application of dry
vacuuming methods for sampling of
materials accumulated on impervious
surfaces.
 Laboratory analyses bulk, liquid and
solid urban runoff samples collected
under various environmental
conditions – samples
characterization.
 Modeling of pollution buildup and
washoff on urban impervious surfaces
URBAN WATER CYCLE

15. 15
 Experimental Catchment Investigations
 Experimental Catchment is
established at Faculty of Civil
Engineering in Belgrade
 Catchment cover area of approx. 3300
sq. meters with various surface types
(asphalt, stone, concrete, tin roof,
green areas).
 Testing of Water Treatment devices:
settlers, infiltration tanks,...
 Meteorological station established
within the Catchment
 Sampling points with automatic
samplers to be established soon.
URBAN WATER CYCLE
Experimental Catchment
Delineation

17. Aims of the research
Nevena Čule – part of phd research

18. Nevena Čule – part of phd research
Biological system for the treatment of polluted water

19. Resent devastating floods in Serbia raised the question about
the efficiency of “grey infrastructure” in flood protection,
because of their limited life span and declining benefits,
while, on the other hand, human and material assets
protected by grey infrastructure are becoming more valuable,
the exposure to flood hazard grows even faster. Green
infrastructure solutions are less expensive etc…..
VALUATION OF FLUVIAL ECOSYSTEMS RESTORATION IN FUNCTION
OF FLOOD RISK MITIGATION
Multi-Functional, Multi-Objective
Optimization and Reduction of Flood Risk

20. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Main Partners
Association for Water Technology and
Sanitary Engineering
Serbian Association for Hydrology and
Hydraulic Engineering
Association Milutin Milankovic
Public Water Utilities from the region
SMEs in the Area of Water

21. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Association for Water Technology and
Sanitary Engineering
The Main Activities
 20th International Conference: Water Supply and
Waste Water Systems, May 2019, Jahorina (Pale),
BiH
 Water Fair and Water Forum, November 2019,
Belgrade
 Water Forum:
 International Cooperation and Strategic Projects,
 Selected Topics,
 Young Water Professionals, PhD Students,
Master Students
 Asset Management, EU Standards, DVGW etc

22. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
New Research Projects
Call: H2020-SC5-2016-2017 (Greening the Economy),
Topic: SC5-08-2017, Type: IA (Innovation action),
Proposal acronym:
RECONECT (Regenarating ECOsystems with Nature-
based solutions for hydro-meteorological risk
rEduCTion),
Consortium of 37 partners, coordinated by UNESCO
IHE Delft (Prof. Zoran Vojinovic).
Project duration : 60 months. From Serbia: One SME,
and UniBg/UNESCO Chair in Water 4ESD

23. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
New Research Projects
Call: H2020-MSCA-RISE-2017,
Wat-Qual (Water Quality in Drinking Water
Distribution Systems),
•Consortium of 18 Partners, from academy,
public water utilities, water companies etc.,
•University of Sheffield - Coordination.
•UniBG Chair mobility: 8 man*months,
•Public Water Utility Pancevo: 4 man*mon.

24. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Concluding Remarks
In the next period we will continue with the efforts to use
more efficiently scattered resources of the University of
Belgrade, like field facilities at different departments and
capable researchers,
We are planning to offer more courses to similar UNESCO
Water family members in Master Study Programs in the
field of Water, Flood Risk Management, Ecohydrology
and Ecohydraulics.
Concept of Summer School, with a duration of one month,
blended with some distance learning activities, with
SIBSTRIN University Novosibirsk, Baku State University,
Kazakh etc., to extend to regional cooperation - Baja
University, Novi Sad, Banja Luka etc.

25. UNESCO Water Family Meeting,
28 March 2019, Palazzo Zorzi, Venice (Italy)
Concluding Remarks
• Local governments (Užice, Pancevo, Sremska
Mitrovica, Loznica, Belgrade) have provided funding
several studies and consultancies.
• Public Water Utility of Pancevo has been a partner in
one H2020 project (improvement of quality of
service, reliability and safety of the water supply
system).
• Also, two SMEs, the members of the EU H2020
RECONECT project, organization of summer schools
workshops, coordinate project teams for
implemanetation nature based solutions.