European water deficit resilience strategy – call for comments

Until March 4, 2025. The European Commission is waiting for our feedback on the initiative: European Water Resilience Strategy. They can be submitted starting February 4, 2025, using a special form posted on the EC website. The European Water Deficit Resilience Strategy is expected to focus on ensuring proper management of sources, addressing scarcity and strengthening the competitive innovative edge of our water industry, as well as broadly adopting a circular economy approach.

European water deficit resilience strategy – public consultation

All organizations, public bodies and the public are encouraged to participate in the public consultation. Submitted opinions will be taken into account in further work on this initiative.

According to information posted on the European Commission’s website (as part of the initiative’s public consultation), a conference entitled Towards a European Union Water Resilience Strategy will be held in Brussels on March 6, 2025. The event will be part of a consultation process to develop a European water resilience strategy to share knowledge and contribute to a better future. Details of the conference, including the event’s agenda, can be found on the European Commission’s website.

European water deficit resilience strategy – assumptions

The European Water Scarcity Resilience Strategy responds to the demand of Member States, EU institutions and stakeholders – including local authorities, the private sector, NGOs and citizens – to take increased action to address water issues in the EU. At the global level, a strong impetus for action was provided by the 2023 UN conference, where the Union presented its vision and commitments for a water-scarce resilient world by 2050. We wrote about the launch of the Water Scarcity Resilience Strategy in a previous article.

As announced in the Policy Guidelines for the next term of the European Commission for 2024-2029, the European Water Deficit Resilience Strategy will focus on ensuring proper management of sources, addressing scarcity, and strengthening the competitive innovative edge of our water industry and adopting a circular economy approach. The strategy is expected to contribute to mitigating the severe water deficit worldwide.

European water deficit resilience strategy and the need for its implementation

Despite a comprehensive legal framework for the protection and sustainable management of water resources, mismanagement has led to the degradation and pollution of water and related ecosystems, mainly coastal and marine. Over the past five years, floods, prolonged droughts and water scarcity have covered more and more areas of the EU and continue to worsen as a result of climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss.

These events are harming the environment, the economy and people and increasing tensions between them. Water is increasingly becoming a limiting factor in various economic sectors. Weather events and mismanagement have caused several hundred billion euros worth of damage in the EU. The transboundary nature of water problems, their cross-cutting nature, and their relevance to the implementation of EU policies and legislation in various fields provide a clear basis for a European deficit resilience strategy.

Given the central role of the Member States and local authorities in water management, any actions identified in the initiative will take into account the principle of subsidiarity and the differences in water availability and demand that exist between EU regions and Member States.

European water deficit resilience strategy – what is its goal?

The overall goal of the European Water Scarcity Resilience Strategy is to set a clear path to achieving water security and scarcity resilience, while mainstreaming water issues across policies and funding sources. It also aims to increase investment, mobilize research and innovation, and eliminate the shortage of skilled labor, taking into account social impacts and territorial disparities to ensure an equitable transition.

The initiative will focus on three specific objectives:

• Restoring and protecting the disrupted hydrological cycle;
• Providing clean and affordable water and a water and sewage system for all;
• Promoting a competitive EU water industry and water rationalization and a closed-loop economy.

The initiative will address five areas of action: governance and implementation; infrastructure, financing and investment; security; and industry, innovation and education. It will have a strong international dimension, contributing to sustainable development and promoting cross-border cooperation for peace, stability and security.

The initiative will build on the strengthened EU water legislation and support its implementation. It will also contribute to several other priorities of the European Commission, including the announced vision for agriculture and food, the Clean Industry Pact, the chemical industry package, the Closed Economy Act and the European Ocean Pact.

The likely effect of the initiative will be to ensure the availability of clean water, better protection against risks by increasing the coherence and complementarity of all EU water-related policies and actions, and to strengthen commitment and cooperation and build trust between water-using sectors and other stakeholders.