The Delegation of the European Union today hosted the closing event of the EU-funded project “Capacity Building in the Water Sector in BiH”. Worth more than 2.3 million euro, the project aimed to support further transposition and implementation of the EU water-related directives, bringing the BiH water sector closer to requirements of the EU acquis, as well as improving management of water resources of the Sava River Basin.

The project is part of the extensive EU support to the environment sector in BiH. Only the support allocated under IPA 2007 – 2011 programme to this sector amounts up to 90 million euro, including both capacity building and environmental infrastructure projects.

“Working with our main partners, institutions responsible for water management at state, Entity and District Brčko levels, the project helped enhance process of EU approximation in the water management sector and facilitate meeting relevant international obligations of BiH,” said Melvin Asin, Head of Cooperation at the Delegation of the EU to BiH. “We hope that Bosnia and Herzegovina authorities will ensure sustainability of results delivered under this project and further advance in area of water management. In that respect, tangible progress in delivering the country-wide strategy in environment sector is needed. This can facilitate the EU accession path, enhance approximation in this field and provide for IPA II support which is currently not available in this important sector.”

Head of Water Resources Section at the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Relations Boško Kenjić said: “Over the past two years we have worked very intensively on implementation of this project, and I think that we have managed to achieve very important results and create key documents that will lead us to considerably raising the level of EU acquis transposition.” Kenjić added that water tariff policies were also considered. “We identified what further steps institutions should take, in order to ensure the corresponding return of expenses and adequate implementation of the Management Plan,” Kenjić concluded.

“BiH came in the position to bring water management legislation very close to similar legal solutions existing in the EU Member States by preparing these  legal norms for transposition of 9 water-related EU Directives and amending the existing water laws in FBiH and RS,” Senad Pločo, Project‘s Team Leader said. “Among others, preparing the first Sava River Basin Management Plans in accordance with the EU Water Framework Directive, allows FBiH, RS and Brcko District to very soon adopt new strategic documents aimed at better decision making concerning water use, water quality/quantity protection and pollution reduction in the Sava River Basin.”

Over 27 months of implementation, the Project produced more than 100 different documents. The most important ones are:
(i) Draft legislation norms to provide for further transposition of the EU water acquis into existing BiH water related legislation, i.e. by transposing provisions of the water related EU Directives through number of draft bylaws to the existing entities’ Waters Laws;
(ii) First Sava River Basin Management Plans in BiH for the period 2016 – 2021, comprising 3 River Basin Management Plans for Sava River for FBiH, RS and BD BiH, and at the country-level, the Roof report and Programme of Measures for BiH for Sava RBM Plans and corresponding Programme of Measures for BiH;
(iii) Water Tariff Policy Framework based upon tariff setting at the local level and the Guidelines for determination of water fees for water abstraction and wastewater discharge;
(iv) Human Resource Plan with a Recruitment and Training Plan for water sector in BiH; and
(v) An Action Plan for strengthening the existing Water Information Systems in BiH.

The project Capacity Building in the Water Sector in BiH  has been financed by the European Union in the amount of  2,351,000 Euro from the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance to Bosnia and Herzegovina (IPA 2011). The project was implemented by Eptisa Servicios de Ingenieria S.L. from Madrid, Spain.