In West Africa, control of water resources has become a major geopolitical issue. Since 2024, at the head of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre (CGRE), Ivorian engineer Kouakou Alexis Kouassi has been leading a diplomatic drive to turn transboundary water resources into a driver of stability, regional cooperation and economic development. Through strategic partnerships and the vast challenge of access to safe drinking water, his work now places water governance at the heart of West Africa’s future.
Since early 2024, at the head of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre (CGRE), Ivorian engineer Kouakou Alexis Kouassi has emerged as a key figure in environmental diplomacy crucial to regional stability. A graduate of the National Polytechnic Institute Félix Houphouët-Boigny in Yamoussoukro, he is tasked with the enormous responsibility of coordinating the governance of 25 transboundary river basins shared across the 15 ECOWAS member states. For this modern manager, water is no longer merely a sanitation issue, but an invisible driver of economic development and regional peace.
“Today, the issue of integrated water resources management is more than fundamental. This management indeed makes it possible to create the link between water and many other sectors, notably the energy sector and, naturally, the food sector as well.”
Alex Kouakou Kouassi, Director of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre – Côte d’Ivoire
To turn this ambition into reality, the Ivorian expert is pursuing an assertive and proactive diplomatic approach. Under his leadership, the CGRE has strengthened its influence through several high-level strategic partnerships: from technical cooperation with the West African Power Pool (WAPP) to secure and harness the region’s hydroelectric potential, to the signing in February 2026 of a major cross-border agreement with the African Water and Sanitation Association (AAEA). This partnership also responds to a critical continental emergency: mobilizing part of the estimated $40 billion in annual investments needed to deliver concrete solutions for the 400 million Africans still lacking access to safe drinking water.
“The participation of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre is intended to connect the Centre with stakeholders in the sustainable energy sector and to make available to these actors the West African regional water resources policy, which calls on them, as stakeholders, to significantly increase investment in this sector, particularly by building water resource infrastructure.”
Alex Kouakou Kouassi, Director of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre – Côte d’Ivoire
According to Ivorian engineer Kouakou Alexis Kouassi, the challenge by 2030 is enormous: to reverse the current trend, as more than 155 million people in the sub-region still suffer from chronic lack of access to safe drinking water, resulting in direct economic losses estimated at between 2% and 5% of the annual GDP of several member states.
“In terms of water resources, the major challenges that must be addressed very quickly include first of all having a good understanding of the resource, meaning water resources at the regional level, particularly surface water and groundwater resources. We are working with development partners and technical and financial partners to gain sufficient knowledge of all water resources in West Africa.”
Alex Kouakou Kouassi, Director of the ECOWAS Water Resources Management Centre – Côte d’Ivoire
According to reports from the WHO/UNICEF Joint Monitoring Programme, only about 31% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa has access to safely managed drinking water services, while 14% of people spend more than 30 minutes a day collecting water.
