The importance of building water resilience is becoming more and more clear to politicians and citizens as Europe is facing another summer of severe droughts leading to disruptions of water supply, damages to crop production and severe water stress in vulnerable aquatic ecosystems.
Strengthening Europe´s water resilience requires better strategies to tackle water scarcity and droughts, which are being intensified by climate change. The EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 and the EU Climate Adaptation Strategy under the European Green Deal have set priorities to urge Member States to take action. These EU strategies ask EU Member States to strengthen the implementation of ecological flows and to improve water allocation systems.
European research delivers key insights on the design and implementation of regulations being used for water allocation and ecological flows in different countries and highlights areas where actions need to be strengthened.