Europe’s rivers nowhere near healthy by 2027 deadline – report

CCB • October 26, 2021

90% of river basins studied in various EU countries will still be unhealthy by 2027, new research reveals. This means those countries will miss the legally binding EU target to return Europe’s dirty freshwaters to health by then. 

Member States have only a few weeks left to finalise their river basin management plans for the next six years, as EU law requires. The drafts for 2022-2027 are the third round of national plans before the 2027 target and are Europe’s final opportunity to get things right. 

The second edition of this report, published by WWF and the Living Rivers Europe Coalition [1], finds that only two out of the 21 river basins analysed – both in Finland – might see good health by 2027. However, even the plans for those two basins contain gaps, in particular concerning the level of funding. For this edition, WWF assessed eight new draft plans from Poland, Romania and Spain, none of which are classed as “good”. 

Draft River Basin Management Plan assessed in this report and their performance scores: 

Claire Baffert, Senior Water Policy Officer, WWF European Policy Office, said: “Instead of focusing their efforts on the final sprint towards healthy rivers in 2027, too many EU countries are dragging their feet. Our rivers deserve good planning; serious measures; credible investments. Unless this is reflected in their final plans, many EU countries are racing straight towards a breach of EU law.” 

Six draft plans rank poorly, including the two assessed Italian plans, two assessed German plans, the Dutch Rhine plan, and the International Odra plan. Most of the river basins suffer from a lack of national budget allocated to water management, insufficient integration of water protection into other policies – in particular energy, agriculture and infrastructure – and the multiple misuses of derogations – all issues that were already flagged in the 2019 Fitness Check conclusions of the Water Framework Directive’s (WFD) evaluation and have been repeatedly highlighted since then.

The performance of the draft RBMPs is ‘poor’ for nearly half of the analysed indicators, including pollution, excessive water extraction, blockages like dams, poor flood and drought management, agriculture, hydropower, coal mining and missing nature-restoring measures. EU countries – which have until the end of this year to publish their final RBMPs according to the Water Framework Directive– must address the shortcomings identified in the draft plans to change the future for our freshwaters and meet the 2027 goal. 

Mark Owen, Freshwater Policy Advisor, European Anglers Alliance said: “Hundreds of thousands of EU citizens came together during the Protect Water campaign to ensure that Member States meet their obligations under the Water Framework Directive. This massive mobilisation was a clear signal for the Commission to hold European governments accountable for delivering on their commitments. Citizens depend on freshwater for their health and well-being, they mustn’t be ignored.” 

WWF and partners are also very concerned that in September 2021, at least nine Member States (Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Slovenia, some river basins in Spain, and the UK [2]) had not yet presented their draft plans for all river basins.

Ewa Leś, CCB Working Group Leader on River Basin and Wastewater Management, and Artur Furdyna, from Friends of Ina and Gowienica rivers Association (CCB Member Organization), contributed to the report.

The report, ‘The final sprint for Europe’s rivers: An NGO analysis of 2022-2027 draft River Basin Management Plans’ is available here, along with a summary.

NOTES 

[1] Living Rivers Europe is a coalition of five environmental and angling organisations gathering WWF’s European network, the European Anglers Alliance, European Environmental Bureau, European Rivers Network, The Nature Conservancy and Wetlands International.

[2] As the Directive was signed by the UK government prior to the UK’s split with Europe, it has been transposed in to UK law and therefore continues to apply.

Contacts:
Ines Abbas
Communications Officer
iabbas@wwf.eu
+32 488 99 27 65 1

Don't reopen the EU Common Fisheries Policy (CFP). Implement it.

By CCB • June 15, 2026
The European Commission's evaluation confirms what environmental NGOs across Europe have long argued: the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP)'s challenge is not its design, but its implementation.

Joint NGO recommendations on Baltic Sea fishing opportunities for 2027

By CCB • June 10, 2026
The poor status and decline of many Baltic Sea fish populations have been thoroughly documented over several decades, indicating that the entire ecosystem is in great distress. So far, policy interventions have not reversed, or even halted, the negative trend concerning many of these populations. The European Commission itself recently recognised in its Common Fishery Policy (CFP) evaluation report that progress on stock rebuilding is lacking and the number of stocks “ threatened by collapse due to impaired recruitment has increased during the reporting period ”. Fish populations that once formed the cornerstone of the Baltic Sea fishery, such as the eastern and western Baltic cod and the western Baltic herring, are now doing so poorly that the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) is advising zero catch for these stocks. Yet, even with the targeted fishery being closed for some years now, none of these three stocks are showing sufficient signs of recovery. The condition (such as size and weight-at-age) of many flatfish populations, such as plaice, also raises alarm bells. The salmon spawning migration has fallen short of the target level in the past three years5. As a result, even the healthiest salmon stocks are now unlikely to produce enough smolts corresponding to sustainable levels in the coming years. To address the crisis facing Baltic populations and the broader ecosystem, political will and ambition to improve fisheries management, alongside full implementation of the CFP provisions, are needed. The recent INI report on the Baltic Sea Multi-Annual Plan shows that the European Parliament recognises the importance of ecosystem-based fisheries management as well as the need for consideration of environmental legislation when making decisions on fishing opportunities.6 Fisheries managers must now act swiftly and decisively on the commitment the Commission and Baltic Sea Member States made at last year’s October Agrifish Council to rebuild Baltic Sea stocks. This document presents the joint NGO recommendations regarding Baltic Sea fishing opportunities for 2027, prioritising long-term ecosystem health and sustainable fisheries management over short-term economic interests. The recommendations are based on the ICES advice, the objectives and requirements of the CFP8 and the Baltic Multiannual Plan (MAP), specifically to apply the precautionary approach and implement an ecosystem-based approach to fisheries management, and the objective of achieving Good Environmental Status (GES) under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). Last year’s overarching joint Briefing Series on TAC-setting, co-signed by almost 30 organisations across the EU and the UK, including environmental NGOs, recreational fishers, and fishing rights owners, remains valid and provides further context, background and detailed explanations on the cross-cutting issues raised in this document. Read the Joint NGO recommendations on Baltic Sea fishing opportunities for 2027 here .