Report: European Rivers Are in Trouble

A report from the European Environmental Agency calls attention to the poor state of European rivers, which are suffering from the effects of overuse and climate change.

As Leonie Cater explains in an article for Politico, “The health of Europe's surface water is in a particularly poor state, the report found. Its rivers and lakes are turning brown, most protected fish and amphibian species in the EU risk becoming locally extinct, and harmful blooms of cyanobacteria are on the up.”

According to the report, just 37 percent of the continent’s surface water bodies achieved “good” or “high” ecological status based on the EU’s Water Framework Directive. Meanwhile, “no overall improvement” was detected since the last monitoring cycle. The report blames “insufficient funding and insufficient integration of environmental objectives in sectoral policies.”

The report warns that Europe’s most important rivers will continue to deteriorate without “major changes” in lifestyles and economic development policies. “The EEA is calling on countries and sectors with a ‘heavy impact’ on water like agriculture, energy and transport to ‘accelerate implementation [of environmental policies and initiatives] to deliver more tangible environmental improvements.’”