Renewable water resources under the changing climate
in accordance with the EU WFD practices and principles will also quickly enable the EaP countries to develop the seasonal WEI at the basin level, as it is implemented by the EEA across the EU.
Figure 3.2
Share of inflow from neighbouring countries and internal flow in the generation of renewable freshwater resources (2017)
%
3.3
Importance of inflow from neighbouring countries
Almost all large rivers — for example, the Dnieper, Dniester, Prut, Aras and Kura — flow through more than one EaP country. There are also international river basins where EU Member States and some EaP countries share hydrological basins or they are riparian (9). For instance, the Danube (Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Moldova and Ukraine), Vistula (Poland, Ukraine and Belarus), Neman (Lithuania and Belarus) and Daugava (Latvia and Belarus) are some of the river basins hydrologically linking the countries (EEA, 2012b). The EU Water Framework Directive underlines the importance of coordination with those non-member states where the river basins extend beyond the boundaries of the EU with reference to the UN Water Convention (EU, 2000). Water inflow from neighbouring countries is an indispensable part of generating the RWR in the downstream countries. Therefore, coordination and cooperation among the respective countries are vital to sustain freshwater ecosystems and meet socio‑economic water demand in line with international norms, such as the UNECE Water Convention, which is a long-term UN endeavour. In many cases, a large proportion of RWR are generated in the upstream or riparian catchments of the international basins. The measure of the proportion of RWR flowing from upstream/neighbouring countries to downstream countries is called the dependency ratio. Because all large rivers flow through the countries, water inflowing from neighbouring countries also has political impacts among the EaP countries. Aras and Kura start from Turkey and flow through Armenia, Iran and Azerbaijan and Georgia and Azerbaijan to the Caspian Sea. Overall, Azerbaijan is most heavily dependent on the inflow of surface water and groundwater from neighbouring countries, followed by Belarus (Figure 3.2). On average, Azerbaijan's dependency ratio for upstream water is greater than 70 % of its total RWR.
100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Armenia
Georgia
Azerbaijan
Inflow of surface and groundwaters from neighbouring countries
Belarus Internal flow
Note:
Data provided under the ENI SEIS II East project. Due to insufficient data from Moldova and no data from Ukraine, neither of these countries could be included in the chart. Inflow from neighbouring countries for Georgia has been estimated as a substitute for the internal flow from total renewable freshwater resources for 2017, as no data are available for the respective year.
Data source:
Armenia: ArmStatBank (Statistical Committee of the Republic of Armenia); Azerbaijan: Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Republic of Azerbaijan; Belarus: Belstat (National Statistical Committee of the Republic of Belarus), National environmental monitoring system of the Republic of Belarus, Water Cadastre Information System of the Republic of Belarus; Georgia: Administration Division at the National Environmental Agency - Ministry of Environment Protection and Agriculture.
Similarly, around 38 % of total renewable water resources is generated by water inflow from neighbouring countries in Belarus. Data and information on inflow from upstream and outflow to the downstream countries are crucially important for dialogue among the countries. However, in many cases, these data are not available. Neither the contribution of the groundwater into inflow or outflow are known. In particular, quantity and quality groundwater resources present a number of 'unknowns' in the EaP countries.
(9) The terms international river basin and riparian countries used in this report do not refer to any legal definition, but rather take the spatial relations of hydrological elements into account derived from the database of the European catchments and rivers network system (Ecrins).
Water availability, surface water quality and water use in the Eastern Partnership countries
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