My name is Okpala Emmanuel Chinonyerem, from Nigeria. I am a researcher currently studying International Water Governance and Water Diplomacy at Ludovika University in Budapest. With close to a decade of experience in the humanitarian aid sector, I have witnessed first-hand how conflict disrupts access to water and how vital that access is to communities under pressure. That experience is what drew me to this field. Hungary's geographical position, where nearly all surface water arrives from seven neighboring countries, and OVF's role in maintaining the technical and diplomatic water relations that make the Danube Basin work, made this internship the natural next step.
The Nile: Overview
The Nile stretches roughly 6,650 kilometres from the East African highlands to the Mediterranean and is shared by eleven countries: Egypt, Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Eritrea. Its two main tributaries, the White Nile from Lake Victoria and the Blue Nile from Lake Tana in Ethiopia, meet at Khartoum. Wherever a river crosses borders, the same question follows: how do you manage a resource that no single government fully controls? The Nile shows both what cooperation can achieve and what its absence costs.
Fig. 1: The Nile Basin and its major dams and infrastructure. Source: Wheeler et al., 2020.
The Blue Nile supplies about 85% of the water reaching Egypt and Sudan, even though it originates in Ethiopia. The 1959 Nile Waters Agreement between Egypt and Sudan left all upstream states with no formal water allocation. A more inclusive replacement, the Cooperative Framework Agreement, entered into force in 2024 after six upstream states ratified it but without Egypt or Sudan, the countries where tension is sharpest.
The Stakes and Why It Keeps Rising
The Nile Basin's population, already over 500 million, is expected to roughly double by 2050. Egypt depends on the river for about 97% of its renewable freshwater, while Ethiopia has made large-scale hydropower a national priority. That priority produced the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), now Africa's largest hydroelectric facility, inaugurated in September 2025 with a reservoir of 74 billion cubic metres. The two countries' dams are now hydraulically linked, yet there is still no binding agreement on how to operate them together.
Aerial view of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Source: The Great Africa, 2024.
That gap has real consequences. In late 2025, flooding displaced over 1,200 families near Khartoum; Sudanese officials pointed to GERD releases as a factor, while Ethiopian officials disputed this. Research suggests that sharing GERD electricity across the region could ease pressure on Ethiopia to maximise storage and increase downstream releases, leaving every country better off than if acting alone. However, that outcome requires coordination that does not yet exist.
Lake Nasser, formed by the Aswan High Dam, seen from space (blue arrow). Source: NASA Earth Observatory, 2015.
What the Danube Can Teach the Nile
Hungary’s own situation is instructive: nearly all its surface water originates outside the country, arriving through seven neighboring states. That dependence has made transboundary cooperation through the International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River a matter of necessity rather than choice. OVF, as Hungary’s General Directorate of Water Management, and collaboration with the UNESCO Chair on Water Conflict Management at Ludovika University bring exactly this kind of experience and a neutral footing to questions like the Nile’s. Their most realistic near-term contribution would be supporting joint hydrological monitoring and real-time data sharing between Nile riparian states: the least politically sensitive starting point, and the foundation any future operating agreement between Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt would need.
Map of the Danube Basin, shared by 19 countries. Source: Encyclopadia Britannica, 2009.
Closing Thought
The GERD is built, filled, and generates power. What remains open is whether Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt choose to operate the river as the single connected system it physically is or keep managing it separately and absorbing the recurring costs of doing so. For a basin supporting more than 500 million people, that choice will shape the region's stability for decades to come.