Hungary’s second Science–Policy Interface (SPI) focuses on one of the country’s most pressing issues — sustainable water management. It explores how to encourage farmers to work together on collective water resource management and how such collaboration can support more resilient landscapes. Within the VISIONARY project, AKI leads a series of SPI workshops that bring together experts from policy, academia, farming, and civil society. This diverse group — including water engineers, policymakers, researchers, farmers, and community representatives — works together to understand what drives and hinders cooperation in water management.

The first workshop invites participants to imagine the future of Hungarian water management through a foresight exercise. Discussions reveal that while sustainable water management is a shared goal, progress is limited by the absence of a common “water vision” that unites all stakeholders. Fragmented governance and competing interests among farmers, authorities, and environmentalists make it difficult to find common ground.
The second workshop builds on these insights, highlighting that uncertainty over land and infrastructure ownership remains one of the biggest barriers to collective action. Participants agree that without coordinated, landscape-scale solutions and fair compensation systems, true systemic change will be hard to achieve.

As VISIONARY draws to a close, AKI is finalising its case study on the preferences and motivations of Hungary’s water management community. In the final workshops, participants will review the findings and help shape practical policy recommendations to support more integrated and collaborative water management in the future.