The European Committee has realized that the pollutions, the over usage of water and the change in the hydromorphological state of waters endangered the European water resources. This recognition lead to the birth of European Union’s new water policy by enforcement of Water Framework Directive (WFD) no. 2000/60 EC on 22 of December 2000.
The regulations of WFD give a legal frame for the European Union member countries to protect inland surface and groundwaters, transitional and coastal waters of seas and oceans. The WFD determines tasks and reports with different contains and for various deadlines to complete for the member states, which are concluded in the following figure:
The schedule of implementing the Water Framework Directive
The governmental order no. 221/2004 (VII.21.) [link: https://net.jogtar.hu/jogszabaly?docid=a0400221.kor ] regulates the national river basin management planning in Hungary.
The interdependent levels and structure of river basin management planning is shown in the following figure:
Structure of planning process
Hungary’s first river basin management plan, – as a first step of implementation of WFD – was launched in April 2010. It is called RBMP1 and can be reached via https://vizeink.hu/korabbi-vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-tervek/vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-terv/.
According to the WFD, the river basin management plans have to be reviewed in every 6 years. Thus, the RBMP2 had been completed by the end of year 2015, as a very first updated and revised version of RBMP1. [link: https://vizeink.hu/korabbi-vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-tervek/vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-terv-2015/], then by 2021, the RBMP3 [link: https://vizeink.hu/vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-terv-2019-2021/vgt3-elfogadott/]. The RBMP3 lists the human impacts on waters, summarizes the status assessment of our waters and the progress that is necessary for reaching the „good status” and relying on these, it determines the action plan for the period of year 2021-2027.
According to the WFD, the process of river basin planning is a multi-stage, interactive-like and through this, the ecological, technical, social and economical point of views have to be harmonized. The most important steps of planning is shown in the following figure:
The process of river basin management planning
The problems – related to water scarcity, water pollution, decrease in ecosystems integration, deterioration of arable soil, gaps in the necessary water utility infrastructure and the occurrence of extreme hydrological events (record-breaking floods, flash floods and droughts) – are occurring more frequently and to a greater extent in the whole World and in Hungary as well.
The anthropogenic originated climate change basically brings new challenges for the human race. As around 80 % of the effects of climate change manifests in water, through water and by water, the sustainable water management, protecting our waters is a vital question of sustaining the human race and natural ecosystems.
The Hungarian Government announced Hungary’s second-time revised water management plan (called RBMP3 [link: https://vizeink.hu/vizgyujto-gazdalkodasi-terv-2019-2021/vgt3-elfogadott/ ]) at the end of April in 2022 by its decision no. 1242/2022. (IV. 28.).
The purpose of RBMP is to collate the environmental objectives of the WFD to be reached by 2027 as well as the measures ensuring attainment in regard of needs of agriculture, rural development, energy production, navigation, tourism, adaptation to climate and good water status together with social and economic goals.
The website of Hungary’s river basin management can be reached via https://vizeink.hu/. The aim of the website is to provide full information on the process of planning and about the content of plans for all concerned people.