2.4 Strategic flood risk management

please provide general comments on section 2.4 here

Strategic flood risk management can be described as a section of the wider integrated water management and planning approach for river basins and coastal areas. It focusses on reducing flood risks AND promoting environmental, societal and economic opportunities nowadays AND in the long term (Sayers, et al., 2015). The concept of risk management is under constant evolution, in particular in adopting an adaptive approach, which works with natural processes, contributes to ecosystem services in a positive way and is part of an integrated water management approach (Sayers, et al., 2013; WMO 2009). Although always appreciated in academia and at local scale, the attention for beneficial relationship between floods and ecosystem services at planning level is a rather recent development (Sayers, et al., 2015).

Large flood events have an impact on thinking, policy and practices in flood risk management. The river floods in 1947 and devastating coastal floods of 1953 raised issues on food security and the need for clear roles and responsibilities in flood risk management together with a boost in increased performance of warning systems. The large river floods in several years during the 1990s paved the way for a basin-wide flood risk management and a larger role for non-structural measures in addition to the structural ones and an increased awareness for the role of spatial planning (e.g. in Room for the River and related policies and practices) . The 2007 floods in the UK, and the whole review process (Pitt, 2008) clearly indicates the need to consider all sources of flooding and their combined occurrence as well as the need for detailed spatial information. It is probably too early to define how the recent floods (see section 2.1) in Central Europe and the Balkan shaped and changed our thinking on flood risk management.

To understand flood risk, one has to understand its different components and their interrelations to make informed decisions. Figure 2.1 gives a clear overview of them.

Figure 2.1       The components of risk

Source: (Sayers, et al., 2015)

Flood risk management, as the management of natural hazards in general, is one of the elements supporting the broad aims of sustainable development (UNISDR 2015) as clearly stated in the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 (UN 2015). A strategic flood risk management approach supporting sustainability is therefore, in contrast to the still widespread misconception, much more than maintaining the integrity of flood control structures now and over long time horizons (Sayers, et al., 2015). It includes maintaining, restoring and strengthening the long-term health of all associated ecosystems, societies and economies by promoting the following key principles (Sayers, et al., 2015):

• efficiency and fairness: maximizing the utility of an investment while ensuring a process that also protects the most vulnerable members of society;

• resilience and adaptive capacity: purposeful approaches to strategy development and design that are inherently risk based and actively manage uncertainty; and

• safeguarding ecosystem services: soft path measures (like land use changes or wetland restoration) and selective hard path measures (e.g. bypass channels or controlled storage) both offer opportunities to simultaneously manage flood risk and promote ecosystem services.

The synergies between different types of measures, even between different types of infrastructural measures are often overlooked and concepts like working with natural processes or natural water retention measures need to be in the core toolkit of every flood risk manager.

The flood risk manager (and water manager) cannot do this alone, as a wide variety of EU policies are influencing the intersections between flood risk management, flood vulnerability and environmental impacts in a significant way (see chapter 4). These are not only environmental policies, like the WFD and BHDs, but also policies on agriculture or pollution. While there are many examples of improved environmental quality in Europe’s environment (EEA 2015e) including Europe’s waters (EEA 2015a), there is still room for improvement by better implementation of policies and public participation with active involvement rather than only information supply or consultation. For the later one, many good examples can be found to learn from (EEA 2014e) although in general, there is a lack of data really tailored to purpose (see also subsection 4.2.4 on Governance).

Where many environmental problems which require concerted action (because of their global or cross-border nature, or because they can be handled more efficiently and transparently on EU level) benefit from EU policies, there’s a gap to bridge in cross-boundary goal settings for specific issues (IEEP 2013), including flood risk management and in the implementation of the existing policies (EC 2012c). As chapter 4 further clarifies synergies between water (WFD, floods directive) and nature legislation (BHDs) is underexploited, a conclusion that can be repeated for synergies between water legislation and thematic policies like the rural development regulation (EU 2013b) of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

Policies and their implementation are complemented by practices. For several EU countries, the floods directive as such did not radically change all existing practices of which some already exist for decades or even ages. Other practices get renewed or new attention. A flood risk management approach focussing on reducing fatalities and affected people is an example of the previous one, where mapping the environmental vulnerability is (at country level) new for most countries. The same is true for natural water retention measures or measures working with natural processes (EC 2014a): some measures will sound very familiar to flood managers while others will be new in some regions of Europe or are used but without fully exploiting the synergies with water and nature goals.