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4.3.2        Tackling pressures from agricultural water use

Agriculture is a major driver of abstraction pressure in EU’s water bodies (Chapter 3.2). The EU’s response to abstraction pressures has been mostly cross-sectoral, formalised through the EU Action on Water Scarcity and Droughts 2007 and consolidated through the Blueprint for Safeguarding Europe’s Waters 2012. At river basin level, the implementation of RBMP has led to the uptake of a wide variety of management measures on agricultural irrigation (EC, 2019a).

Prior-authorisation and abstraction control

Under the WFD, significant abstraction points in surface water and groundwater should be registered and subject to prior-authorisation through e.g. a permit system. Member States should inspect and enforce penalties on non-authorised users who does not comply with the specification of the permit requirements.

Recent evaluations indicate that member states have adopted various mechanisms to better control agricultural abstraction. Authorisation procedures are generally in place in all Member States and the majority of countries and RBDs have also conducted assessments of water balances (Buchanan et al., 2019). Water balances provide an overview of the volume and flow of water in the various components of the hydrological cycle within a specified hydrological unit (e.g. a river catchment or river basin), occurring both naturally and as a result of the human induced water abstractions and returns. Water balances are seen as essential components of sound quantitative management of water resources under the WFD (EC, 2015).

Some countries have gone further by limiting water abstraction and issuing volumetric allocations that take into account the renewable freshwater resources and environmental flow requirements. France for instance has adopted volumetric management where capped agricultural allocations are managed by agricultural user groups, while some river basin authorities and user groups in Spain have established sophisticated controls on capped abstraction (Box 4.3).

Despite progress, there remains significant implementation issues regarding abstraction control. Illegal abstraction in the form of unauthorised, unregistered, unmeasured or unmetered abstraction, also continues to be a major challenge (Schmidt et al., 2020). Half of the wells in European Mediterranean countries may be unregistered or illegal (EASAC, 2010). Not all abstraction points are reported, and volumes are not systematically metered. The multitude of abstraction points makes it particularly difficult for authorities to regulate water use. However, river basin authorities are developing sophisticated strategies to improve the recording of agricultural abstraction and its monitoring (Schmidt et al., 2020).

Most Member States apply exemptions to permitting and the registration of small abstractions, and the analysis of abstraction may not consider the cumulative impact of abstraction points. This is a major concern for groundwater but also surface water bodies where farmers abstract water through individual pumping systems. The lack of consideration of, and control over, small abstraction points in some Member States lead to an underestimation of abstraction levels from agriculture.

Finally, further work is needed to harmonise the use of water balances across river basins. To realise their full potential, water balances must give careful consideration to system interconnectivity between surface water and groundwater bodies, the relationship between water flow, quality and ecological status, the consideration of climate change and assumptions regarding consumptive use and return flows. Further guidance is planned in the recent Biodiversity Strategy 2030 (EC, 2020d) regarding how to better link the review of abstraction permits with the aim of restoring ecological flows under the WFD.