Innovative Approaches Towards Sustainable River Basin Management in the Baltic Sea Region: The WATERPRAXIS Project

This paper describes the scientific background, main elements and final results of the WATERPRAXIS project, which was implemented in 2009–2012 under the Interreg IVB Baltic Sea Region Programme 2007–2013 between seven coastal countries of the Baltic Sea Region (BSR). The special focus of this project was on the reduction of excessive nutrient loads to the Baltic Sea through support in implementation of cost- and eco-efficient water protection measures in the region. The rationale behind the WATERPRAXIS project was the need to tackle the continuing eutrophication of the Baltic Sea, a phenomenon which concerns scientists and governments alike. The clear dependencies between the bad quality of river waters flowing into the sea and its ecological state are well known and are already reflected in the European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD) (Schernewski et al. in J Coast Conserv 12(2):53–66, 2008). The EU WFD requires large-scale river basin management plans (RBMP) to be developed and implemented for each river basin district, aiming to achieve at least good ecological status in all European water bodies, including coastal seas, by 2015. However, this idealistic approach is hindered in practice by several barriers, in particular the large cover of RBMP and lack of good examples of the best local practices in river basin management. The WATERPRAXIS project tried to overcome these challenges and offer examples of successful water management initiatives from several countries around the Baltic Sea (Ulvi 2011). As a concrete output of the project, four different investment plans which realise water protection measures were implemented in Poland, Lithuania, Denmark and Finland.