Posted on February, 02 2010

World Wetlands Day is being celebrated today in the Danube River basin countries with full awareness of the importance of the Danube’s greatest biological riches - its green corridor of wetlands and floodplains - that are important not only for nature, but also for humans, providing a host of different services.

The most international river basin in the world is currently home to 83 million people. The value of the various benefits from Danube floodplains, including flood and draught management, climate change adaptation, water purification, fish production, reed harvesting and recreation is estimated to be at least €500 per hectare a year. For example, water purification through nutrient retention of Danube floodplains is worth an estimated €368 million per year.

In addition, the Danube basin wetlands serve as "climate buffers" as wetlands store water for times of draught and soak up excess water thereby reducing flood peaks. Both draughts and floods are likely to increase in frequency and severity in the future, so wetland protection and restoration is a good investment to increase climate resilience.

Despite this estimated value, over 80% of Danube floodplains and wetlands have been lost. Starting in the 19th century, large sections of the river were straightened and corseted with dikes and dams, floodplain areas were cut off, drained and turned to agriculture or other uses. As a result, fish populations have plummeted. Floods are growing in their frequency and destructiveness. We are slowly coming to realise and appreciate all of the former benefits and services that we have lost.

Wetland protection and restoration

But over the past 20-30 years millions of hectares of Danube floodplains have come under protection, while tens of thousands of hectares have been restored.

“Wetlands protection and restoration is key. Wetlands are not only cheap to maintain, but also save money. We are therefore taking steps not only to protect what remains, but actually to regain at least some of what has disappeared”, says Andreas Beckman, Director of WWF Danube-Carpathian Programme.

In Austria, in 1984, tens of thousands of people sat by the river and demonstrated on the streets to protect the floodplains stretching from Vienna to Bratislava – their efforts led to the establishment of the Danube-Floodplain National Park, one of the most popular recreation areas for people in the region.

The fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989 suddenly exposed the rich wetlands of the Morava and Dyje rivers that had been protected in its folds – and opened new possibilities for their protection.

The agreement signed by Hungary and Croatia in 2009 to establish a transborder biosphere reserve on the Drava River paves the way to create Europe’s largest riverine protected area, with as many as 630,000 ha, including areas along the Drava, Mura and Danube rivers in Slovenia, Austria as well as in Serbia – it is a massive area of unique natural and cultural landscapes, Europe’s “Amazon”.

At the turn of the millennium, the governments of Romania, Bulgaria, Moldova and Ukraine signed an agreement to establish the Lower Danube Green Corridor along the Danube’s last 1,000 km. It was and still is the most ambitious wetland protection and restoration initiative in Europe, calling for protection of nearly 800,000 ha of wetlands, and restoration of over 224,000 ha of former floodplains. Ten years on, the target for protection has been even exceeded, with some 1.4 million hectares of wetland areas along the Lower Danube under some form of formal protection. Progress with restoration is moving forward, with well over 90,000 ha realised to date.

"Much has been achieved over the last couple of decades in the Danube River basin in terms of wetland protection and restoration, and this must continue," said Andreas Beckmann. "WWF is calling on all countries of the Danube basin to set qualitative and ambitious targets for each country for wetland protection and restoration as a cost-effective means for securing a host of essential ecosystem services, from flood management to clean drinking water as well as climate adaptation. Let us continue giving life to the Danube, so that the Danube can continue giving life to us".