Lessons from LIFE for the Blueprint to safeguard Europe's waters

Next year in 2012 the EU is due to launch major new initiatives in support of its Freshwater Policy. These are to flow from the findings of ongoing assessments of EU policy instruments and of the sustainability of water resources and a great many LIFE project experiences remain relevant to the Blueprint stakeholders.

Hatches

The success of EU policies is regularly reviewed to ensure that European citizens benefit properly from EU activities. As part of this high-level review process, EU water policy is currently undergoing an in-depth assessment of its ability to achieve good status of all EU waters by 2015. The assessment will inform the content of a Blueprint to Safeguard Europe's Water.

The Blueprint, to be presented by the Commission in November 2012, aims at ensuring sufficient availability of good quality water for sustainable and equitable water use, and has three main objectives:

• First, improving the implementation of current EU water policy by making full use of the opportunities provided by the current framework;
• Second, fostering the integration of water and other policies by managing trade-offs through a better understanding of the costs and benefits of both economic activities and water resources management; and
• When necessary, seeking the completion of the current policy framework, especially in relation to water efficiency and adaptation to climate change.

The knowledge base for this work is mainly provided by the ongoing assessment of the River Basin Management Plans under the Water Framework Directive, the review of the policy on water scarcity and drought; and the review of the vulnerability of water resources to climate change and other man made pressures, and a Fitness Check’ of Freshwater Policy.

Work for the Blueprint includes two public consultations (on the Fitness Check between December 2011 and February 2012 and on policy options in March-May 2012), and numerous stakeholder workshops, bringing together Member State representatives with different EU partners who share an interest in water policy. As evidenced at a preliminary Fitness Check workshop in May 2011, many of the policy options to be discussed highlight calls for greater action in areas where LIFE has already been producing positive effects.