European waters - current status and future challenges : synthesis

Download or read book European waters - current status and future challenges : synthesis written by European Environment Agency and published by . This book was released on 2012 with total page 51 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The Europe 2020 strategy is the European Union's strategy for economic growth in Europe over the next decade. This strategy envisages the development of a 'greener', more environmentally friendly economy in Europe. Sustainable water management is a critical element of this green economy because healthy and resilient ecosystems provide the services needed to sustain human well-being and our economy. For this reason, we need to ensure that other economic sectors, such as agriculture, energy and transport, also adopt management practices that can keep water ecosystems healthy and resilient. Some improvements in water quality have been made in the past two decades with e.g. the implementation of the urban waste water treatment directive. Nevertheless at present, the ecological status of water ecosystems is not good enough. Under the Water Framework Directive, countries were obliged to publish so-called River Basin Management Plans, which detailed the status of the water bodies in their countries. The results of the first round of these River Basin Management Plans show that more than half of Europe's surface water bodies are in less than good ecological status."--Editor.