Integrated River Basin Planning – Replicable ... - India Water Portal

Integrated River Basin Planning: India and the EU share experience on policy and practice
Annex
Annex 3
Figure 11 The European Union (in 2008)
Water and Environment Policies in the
European Union
The following two European cases illustrate how proper management of water data
can assist in forming the basis for better decision making so that priority issues can
be addressed.
A3.1 Relevance of the EU context to India
The European Union presently consists of 27 sovereign countries with a total
population of nearly 500 million people. The EU's member states cover an area of
4.4 million square kilometres. In comparison, India consists of 28 states and three
Union Territories with a total population of approximately 1.2 billion people (2.4 times
the EU). India covers an area of 3.3 million square kilometres (0.75 times the EU).
A3.2 EU context
The European Union (Figure 11), tracing its origins to the European Coal and Steel
Community formed among six countries in 1951 and the Treaty of Rome in 1957,
was established in 1993 by the Maastricht Treaty, adding new areas of policy to the
existing European Community. The EU generates an estimated 30 percent share of
the world's nominal gross domestic product (USD16.8 trillion in 2007).
The EU has developed a single market through a standardised system of laws
which apply in all member states, guaranteeing the freedom of movement of people,
goods, services and capital. It maintains a common trade policy, agricultural and
fisheries policies, environmental policies and a regional development policy. The EU
has grown in size through the accession of new member states and has increased
its powers by the addition of new policy areas to its remit.
The original Treaty of Rome did not provide for the environment as a joint policy area.
In the 1970s, governments realised the increasing importance of joint policies and
action on the environment. In this period, the major driver for environmental policy
was environmental and public health. The mandate for introducing environmental
policy at the European level was for many years found in the first treaty’s objective
of establishing a common market and removing trade barriers and distortion of
competition in the economic domain.
As long as there was no such basis, the EU was required to base its environmental
decisions on articles of the treaty that were not designed to be used as a basis for
environmental policy making. As the EU’s environmental policy activity increased,
so too did the need to have a proper framework within the treaty. This was achieved
with the Maastricht Treaty of 1992 that changed the objective of EU
to promote throughout the community a harmonious and balanced
development of economic activities, sustainable and non-inflationary growth,
respecting the environment ….
The treaty also stated that
Community policy on the environment should aim at a high level of protection
taking into account the diversity of situations in the various regions of the
community.
The later 1997 treaty goes a step further referring to
a high level of protection and improvement of the quality of the environment.
Water is now the sector with the most comprehensive coverage in EU environmental
legislation.
A3.3 Overview of EU Water Policy and Legislation
Water and water pollution were among the first environmental concerns in the EU.
The first pieces of EU water legislation were accepted by the European Council
as early as 1973. Since then, European water legislation has taken a leading and
innovative role in the design of national water policy in many EU Member States.
There have been two important periods of EU water legislation. The first period
occurred between 1975 and 1980, resulting in a number of Directives and Decisions
that either lay down water quality objectives for specific types of water (e.g. the
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