Post a comment on the text below

Disaggregate level assessment

Rivers that drain land with intense agriculture or a high population density generally have the highest nitrate concentrations. In the period 2018-2020 (link to chart from 2021 indicator assessment), Czechia and Lithuania had the largest proportion of river sites with average nitrate concentrations exceeding 5.6 mg NO₃-N/l (13% and 16%, respectively). Moreover, Belgium, Denmark, and Switzerland had a high proportion (more than 25%) of sites with concentrations exceeding 3.6 mg NO₃-N/l.

There has been a decrease in river nitrate concentrations at 47% of the monitoring sites since 1992, and an increase at 16% of the sites (Figure 1). Czechia, Denmark, Germany and Slovakia had the highest proportion of significantly decreasing trends (63-100%). France, Ireland, Spain and Switzerland had similar proportions of significantly increasing and decreasing trends, while Estonia had the highest proportion of significantly increasing trends (44%). An overall decline, although slowing in recent years, is observed for Austria, Belgium, Czechia, Denmark, Germany, Serbia and Sweden, contributing to the pattern seen in the European time series.