Event organized by the We Are Water Foundation, ALTAMIRA and WASTE & FINISH Mondial Foundation.
Description
As we trespass more and more planetary boundaries, we all as stewards of the global commons must take action. How can we deal with these interlocking challenges in a context of diminishing public resources and concessional finance for water? We need three revolutions: in understanding, planning, and finance.
A key step in reimagining our economies is rethinking investment origination and partnership design. Water security bridges the development-climate-nature agendas, yet its visibility and attractiveness as an investment asset remain low. Given shifting multilateral and financial landscapes, what are the emerging opportunities? We can seize them, provided we are open to rethinking our practices and narratives, drawing lessons, and debunking myths.
Through gaining a systemic understanding of the crises we face and unlocking collective intelligence, we can strengthen the strategic, economic, commercial, financial, and managerial cases for investment. This session will help us to do this by guiding a necessary systems analysis, drawing on lessons learned to move from chaos to transformation. We will explore the potential of a regeneration approach to address financing and implementation gaps. And, building on this understanding, we will examine trends like impact investing, outcome-based financing, and innovative partnerships for collective action—identifying key leverage points we can and must lift together.
Summary
This interactive workshop will guide a systems analysis, lesson drawing and rethinking process. We will explore the potential of a regeneration approach to address water financing gaps, and examine trends like impact investing, outcome-based financing, and innovative partnerships for collective action—identifying key leverage points we can lift together.
Where and when
28 August 2025 – Stockholm Waterfront Congress Centre
02:00 to 3:30 pm Room 26- Level 2
Attendance registration
Limited seats
Objectives
Through discussion and participative processes, participants will gain an understanding of:
- The evolving landscape of development and environmental finance and its opportunities for water investment.
- Systemic barriers to private sector investment in water security and adaptation, along with leverage points we can lift together to unlock additional finance.
- The principles and tenets of the regeneration approach and its potential to inspire our rethinking and redesigning of financing strategies.
- The pillars of emerging financing opportunities: blended finance, impact investing, outcome based aid and next generation of public-private-civil society partnerships.
- Strengthening the investment case for water within a broader development-climate-social justice-nature theory of change.
Agenda
02:00 – 02:10 pm
Welcome & opening with short documentaries
Carlos Garriga, Director of the We Are Water Foundation
02:10 – 02:25 pm
Keynotes: scene-setting
A systems approach to the sanitation challenge: lessons learned
Nouria Ouibrahim & Sajib Mahanta, WASTE
The regeneration paradigm, bridging global goals with local needs
Mónica Altamirano de Jong, ALTAMIRA Regenerative Finance
02:25 – 02:50 pm
Panel discussion. Unlocking finance for water: from barriers to breakthroughs
Includes a Q&A session from participants
02:50 pm
Breakout groups
Building on the panel, each discussion will explore how to move from barriers to breakthroughs in navigating the evolving global finance architecture—focusing on concrete challenges and opportunities within the water sector.
Moderated by session convenors and members of the RETHINKING coalition.
03:20 – 03:25 pm
Reporting back: insights from group discussions
03:25 – 03:30 pm
Closing remarks
Speakers
Our panel of speakers includes:
Carlos Velázquez
Sustainability & Service Senior Managing Director
After getting his degree in Economics and Business Administration at the UAB, he began working at the international audit group, Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC). After two years as an auditor of PWC, he joined the team of the Internal Audit Department of the Roca Group.
Carlos Velazquez has worked for Roca for 30 years and during all this time he has held different positions in several countries: Internal Auditor in the headquarters (Barcelona), Controller in Roca Maroc (Morocco), Administrative Director of Roca Torneiras (Portugal) and CFO in the subsidiary of the Roca Group in the USA. Later, after three years in the USA, he came back to Barcelona to lead the Corporate Controlling Department until he was transferred to Bulgaria in 2005 as Managing Director of Roca Bulgaria, from where he returned to the headquarters in Barcelona in 2008, to lead the creation and further development of the Corporate Marketing Department of the Roca Group until the end of 2019, when he took the position of Director of Sustainability and Institutional Relations of the Roca Group. In 2025 Carlos, which is a member of the Roca Group Executive Committee, holds the position of Service & Sustainability Senior Managing Director.
In addition to his responsibilities at Roca, Carlos Velázquez is a member of the Board of Trustees of the University School of Design and Engineering of Barcelona (ELISAVA), Board member of the European Association for the Taps and Valves Industry (CEIR), Vice President of the Spanish National Association of Taps and Valves Manufacturers (Agrival), Chairman of the Marketing Working Group of the European Sanitaryware Producers Federation (FECS) and President of the Unified Water Label Association (UWLA).
Carlos Garriga
Director We Are Water Foundation
Degree in Business Administration and Management from the University of Barcelona, with a postgraduate degree in Protocol from UPF. He has developed most of his professional career in the field of communication, working for various agencies and companies such as the Roca Group or the RBA Editorial. In 2010, he began working as Project Manager, being responsible for coordinating the projects carried out by the Foundation together with international organizations such as Unicef, Oxfam Intermon or World Vision International; as well as various awareness initiatives worldwide.
Mónica Altamirano de Jong
PhD, Founder ALTAMIRA
Specialist in Public-Private Partnerships and Systems Thinker. Founder of ALTAMIRA, a boutique consulting firm driving the uptake of regenerative finance through systems thinking, consortium partner NetworkNature (the EU Platform of Platforms on NbS). Independent Director/Board Member CAEI, a group of commercial entities dedicated to the agro-industry managed by Putney Capital Management. Strategic Advisor on Finance and Partnerships for Water for the UN Economic Commission of Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). Salzburg Global Seminar Fellow. With over 20 years of global experience advising governments, MDBs and impact investors on how to catalyze private sector investments in infrastructure, and the climate-water-nature nexus, she is a thought leader in climate finance and resilient infrastructure. Monica is passionate about making a just transition to a regenerative economy financially feasible and partners with public and private sector pioneers in driving a paradigm shift towards a mission-driven approach in infrastructure investment planning.
Sajib Mahanta
WASH Expert, WASTE
With a background in Water Governance from IHE Delft in the Netherlands, Sajib brings over 5 years of experience working on WASH projects with a strong focus on monitoring and evaluation (M&E). At WASTE, he now leads M&E and Gender Equality and Social Inclusion efforts for impact across six countries in Africa and Asia under the FINISH Mondial programme. His work blends data-driven programme management with a systems approach and a deep commitment to intersectionality in delivering inclusive basic services like water and sanitation.
Nouria Ouibrahim
Programme Director, WASTE
Nouria’s expertise was built over the last 20 years. Her experience spans all facets of society from private enterprise, entrepreneurial, and to public institutions. Nouria leads the implementation of WASTE’s FINISH Mondial programme in Africa and Asia. Prior to this, she has been policy adviser within different governmental institutions, to independent consultant in different sectors e.g. water, agriculture, logistics, port development and energy. Nouria is eager to develop a North-South bridge. She created a start-up “LinkedInAfrica” to contribute to transfer of know-how to Africa, by introducing innovative solutions in various sectors based on Dutch expertise and by strengthening international cooperation.
Organizers and collaborators
Organised by: We are Water Foundation, ALTAMIRA and WASTE & FINISH Mondial Foundation.
Collaborators: RETHINKING Coalition and Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)