The Common Implementation Strategy for the Water Framework Directive
Cover page for the Water Directors’ meeting (WD)
Version: 2.0 (small changes on cover page and page 10 (eutrophication) and 11 (Art. 21 Committee) only)
Status:04/06/2002
Note for the WD: The draft conclusions will be discussed on the meeting of 10-12 June 2002.
Agenda Item 6: Progress report on the WFD Common Implementation Strategy
Presented by the Commission
The enclosed document presents the progress report on the WFD Common Implementation Strategy (CIS) for the period November 2001 to May 2002. The report discusses progress in the different levels of the strategy and analyses whether the overall success of the WFD CIS is still ensured. At the end, some emerging issues of horizontal nature were identified by the Commission which should be discuss and concluded upon by the Water Directors. The more specific issues related to an activity or a Working Group under the CIS are dealt with under separate items under agenda point 7 of this meeting.
The Water Directors are invited to:
Take note of the progress report and discuss its conclusion that the implementation of the CIS is, so far, successful and the generally within the time schedule foreseen;
Discuss whether the conclusions of the Water Directors’ meeting of November 2001 in Ghent have been implemented, in particular in relation to the the improvement of the “steering mechanism” in the Strategic Co-ordination Group and the Water Directors;
Discuss the emerging horizontal issues, in particular:
Agreement procedures and final status of the guidance documents;
Allocation of sufficient resources in the second half of 2002
Re-organisation of the Working Groups and new mandates for 2003 and 2004 (“follow-up strategy”)
Establishment and organisation of the “Article 21 Committee”
Joint initiatives on the harmonisation of the application of typology
Identify any other issues which need to be addressed in order to ensure a successful realisation of the Common Implementation Strategy.
Common Implementation Strategy (CIS)
for the Water Framework Directive (WFD)
Progress report
to the Water Directors
on their meeting under Spanish Presidency
Valencia, 10-12 June 2002
Presented by the Commission
under Agenda item 6
Status:30 May 2002
1.Introduction
After the Water Directors reached agreement on the Common Implementation Strategy (CIS) for the Water Framework Directive in May 2001, a series of actions were taken on all key activities identified by the strategy in order to make the CIS operational. In the first progressreport for the period May to October 2001, the Commission presented the results of the first phase of the CIS which was mainly setting up a considerable working process.
The second progressreport provides an overview on the state of play of all activities under the Common Implementation Strategy and covers the period November 2001 to May 2002. This report is mainly based on the presentations, the discussions and the outcome of the last meetings of the Strategic Co-ordination Group (SCG) and on the individual progress reports of the Working Group (WG) leaders.[1]
2.Overall organisation
2.1.Water Directors (WD)
On their meeting under Belgian Presidency on 8/9 November 2001, the Water Directors concluded a number of important points in order to further develop and improve the CIS process, in particular:
To further develop the role and the operation of the meetings of the Water Directors and the Strategic Co-ordination Group in order to implement an efficient “steering mechanism”;
To improve the communication, co-ordination and co-operation between the different Working Groups in order to strengthen the linkages;
To continue efforts to ensure involvement of Candidate Countries and NGOs and stakeholders as an important element of the process;
To start the preparation of some horizontal guidance documents, such as on water bodies, and a common outline and introductory text for all guidance documents.
Following the meeting, the Commission and the other involved parties started several initiatives on all levels resulting in a number of improvements and deliveries as described in the subsequent sections. Furthermore, the overall process was growing immensely and has produced the first outputs as foreseen under the strategy. It has become an increasing challenge, also for the Water Directors, to execute an efficient and proactive management of the Common Implementation Strategy.
In line with the earlier conclusions, the preparation of the meeting of the Water Directors under Spanish Presidency concentrated on the results of the Common Implementation process.
In conclusion, the Water Directors will be invited to evaluate whether the implemented measures on improving the “steering mechanisms” were successful and sufficient.
2.2.Strategic Co-ordination Group (SCG)
The Strategic Co-ordination Group (SCG) was established in order to co-ordinate the different working groups and activities under the CIS and in particular the work in the pilot river basins. Since October 2001, three meetings of the SCG took place, on 27 November 2001, 11 March and 29/30 April 2002. The way of working in the SCG changed considerably, from an “information-exchange” group to a “decision-making” body with more than 40 documents and a total of 500-600 pages being discussed and concluded upon in the last meeting.
This last meeting of the Strategic Co-ordination Group focussed on the preparation of the Water Directors meeting by discussing, in particular:
The outline of the guidance documents as a joint text;
The complete draft guidance documents on economics and the identification of river basin districts;
The presentation of the progress reports and several other documents from other Working Groups and
The discussion of the first draft of the water bodies guidance.
For all these items, conclusions were agreed on the meeting which form the basis for the preparation of the Water Directors.[2]
Since the first meeting of the SCG, the involvement of stakeholders and NGOs increased. At the moment, the following European umbrella associations are invited on the basis of the agreed criteria for participation: COPA/COGECA, ECPA, EEB, EUREAU, EURELECTRIC, EWA, UNICE and WWF. As agreed by the Water Directors, the Commission continues to apply the NGO and stakeholder involvement as an open process.
The discussion on the work programmes of the working groups is now based on unified progress reports of all the working groups (WGs) and the Expert Advisory Fora (EAFs) (for reference see footnote 1). The WG leaders are participating on a regular basis clearly improved communication to the SCG and between the different groups.
In order to further improve the co-ordination and the progress of the Working Groups the Commission has developed a project management tool[3] which has been discussed at the SCG. The Commission intends to make increasing use of the final tool. During the development of the tool, useful analysis such as the linkages between the groups resulted in additional products.
The next meeting of the SCG will take place on 30 September-1 October and 7/8 November 2002 in order to prepare the Water Directors’ meeting under Danish Presidency.
2.3.Working Groups
The progress in the work programme of the different Working Groups (WGs) and the Expert Advisory Fora has been considerable in the last half year. All Working Groups are fully operational and first (interim) results have emerged from each Working Group. Based on the work programmes in the Strategic Paper, the WGs further specified the timetables and formulated concrete work packages which have been collated in the project management tool (cf. footnote 3). As mentioned earlier, a brief description of the latest state-of-play for each WG can be found in the individual progress reports (cf. footnote 1).
Following the specification of the work programmes, a list of deliverables has been agreed for the year 2002 (cf. Annex). All guidance documents that are intended for testing in the pilot river basins must be available by the end of 2002.
Comparing the planning with the current state, most of the deliverables have been delivered in time or are in preparation for finalisation later this year, as agreed. To date, the key outputs of the Common Strategy are:
Report on statistical aspects of the identification of groundwater pollution trends and aggregation on monitoring results (mandate of WG 2.8);
Guidance document on water and economics (mandate of WG 2.6);
Document on the identification of river basin districts (one of the work packages of WG 2.9);
Cases studies and synthesis report on the identification and designation of heavily modified water bodies (one of the mandates of WG 2.2);
Establishment of a pilot basin network (first step for pilot testing under activity 4.1);
Agreement of a general outline for all guidance documents and a common text for the foreword and the introduction (mandate for the Commission);
Table: Overview on some indicators of the progress in the WFD CIS process since May 2001 (Estimations based on WFD CIRCA, project management tool and WGs progress reports).
May – Oct 2001 / Nov 2001 –May 2002 / June – Nov 2002
Number of members in WFD CIRCA / ~ 250 / ~ 600 / > 600
Number of meetings of WGs and EAFs / 25 / 32 / > 20
Number of final “products” from the CIS process / 0 / 4 / 9
Various other technical documents as interim steps towards developing guidance documents, such as common understanding, typology and reference conditions sections and others (part of the mandates of WGs 2.1, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.7 and 3.1).
In relation to the original planning, some delays occurred, in particular on the work package 2 on planning process in WG 2.9, the common understanding document on monitoring of WG 2.7 and on the horizontal guidance on “water bodies” led by the Commission.
The various reasons for the delays were analysed and discussed in the Strategic Co-ordination Group and appropriate measures were decided to ensure that the delays will not affect the overall success of the Common Implementation process.
Significant improvements were made as regards the co-ordination and linkages of the different work programmes in order to ensure coherence amongst the guidance documents produced by the different groups. In addition to various initiatives of joint workshops, joint drafting etc. took place. Moreover, two meetings of the Working Group leaders were widely appreciated as an important way to improve communication and co-ordination. Furthermore, the WG leaders were invited to all meetings of the SCG. However, further efforts need to be made on all sides since the interactions and overlaps become increasingly complex.
A major factor preventing increased co-ordination and reducing the efficiency and the quality of the work is the limited resources in the Member States (WG leaders and WG participants) and the Commission. It is impossible to gather sufficient expertise in all areas that are within the scope of the guidance documents from all Member States in each Working Group. E.g. often few groundwater experts are participating in “horizontal” WGs which makes it difficult to cover related issues in a satisfactory way.
In conclusion, one year of work under the WFD Common Implementation Strategy has resulted in the establishment of an impressive expert network and produced first concrete results. However, the successful finalisation of the expected guidance documents requires further efforts from all involved parties.
2.4.Expert Advisory Fora
The three Expert Advisory Fora (EAF) on “Priority substances”, “Groundwater” and on “Reporting” continued their work programmes. Several meetings were held. Considerable progress was made such as the finalisation of the “conceptual phase” for the preparation for a groundwater directive and the further development of quality standards for priority substances.
The EAF Reporting met twice. In addition to the agreement on a work programme, DG Environment, the JRC and the EEA worked jointly to develop a common vision for general data management and reporting of all water related areas, Which includes the Water Framework Directive as a central piece. The first outline of such a common vision are presented to the Water Directors in Valencia.
2.5.Commission activities to support the implementation strategy
On the last meeting, the Commission reported on a number of activities in order to support the Common Implementation Strategy. Since then, the WFD CIRCA-Interest Group has been further developed. It is now an indispensable tool for the implementation process used by more than 580 users.
In relation to the Information Strategy, the Commission produced some first outputs. A leaflet and a brochure are available in all Community languages.[4] Furthermore, a logo for the WFD Common Implementation Strategy process has been developed (see cover page).
Moreover, a final report has been prepared which outlines a concept for a communication strategy specifically targeted to the WFD CIS. A number of short-, mid- and long-term activities were identified in this report. On this basis, the Commission is in the process of launching an open call for tender to realise a number of the suggested activities, such as the translation of the leaflet and brochure into the languages of the Candidate Countries and the further development of web sites. It is anticipated to implement these activities mainly in late 2002 and in 2003.
Finally, the Water Directors were informed on the last meeting that a Commission’s Framework Contract will provide technical support for the Common Implementation process. Due to administrative problems, the signature of the contract was not possible. Hence, the Commission is in the process of re-launching an open call for tender. Despite the efforts to get external technical support as quickly as possible, the contract is expected to become operational in November 2002 at the earliest.
2.6.Participation of Candidate Countries
The invitation to the Candidate Countries to participate in the implementation process was one of the key conclusions last Water Directors’ meeting. Since the last meeting, the participation in the Working Groups and the requests for access to the WFD CIRCA system have been increasing steadily. Whereas the number of participants of Candidate Countries in the EAFs is fairly high, direct participation in the CIS process is still at low levels. A key factor for changing this situation is the invitation of Candidate Countries to the Strategic Co-ordination Group meetings. As discussed under a separate agenda point, the Commission invites the Water Directors in Valencia to agree full involvement of Candidate Countries.
3.Summary and emerging issues
The second phase of the Common Implementation Strategy for the Water Framework Directive has been concluded successfully. A considerable number of products and interim products have been produced and the major part of the activities is within the agreed time schedules.
However, there are a number of issues which need to be addressed:
Agreement procedures and final status of the guidance documents
In the preparation of the meeting, the first products emerged from the Common Implementation Strategy such as the economic guidance and the river basin district report. Although the agreement mechanisms appeared to be clear, it has been difficult to implement them in practice for various reasons. First, the commitment to work on the basis of consensus poses the question on how to deal with minority views without compromising for the “lowest common denominator”. Second, it was agreed in the strategic document that the “organisational structure is not intended as a new formal forum for decision-making”. It is, however, necessary to make certain decisions over diverging views within a short time in order to ensure the overall success of the exercise. It is a challenge for the Member States and the Commission on how such “informal and fast decision-making” processes are established when a number of different views, approaches and expectations are raised. Third, the full involvement of NGOs and stakeholders and, in the future, the Candidate Countries further increases the challenge since the number of different views are inevitably increasing. Finally, the views on the final status of the guidance document appear to be different. There has been a discussion on whether the Water Directors should “agree” or “endorse” the final text and whether the documents should be “living documents” or “final versions”. Agreement was reached in the SCG that once the documents have been approved by the WDs, they should be made available to the public through the internet and, if possible, published.
Since this is crucial point for the future organisation of the CIS, the Commission would appreciate an open discussion and clear guidance from the Water Directors.
Attribution of sufficient resources in the second half of 2002
The finalisation of nine guidance documents in the second half of 2002 will be a challenge which requires a considerable amount of efforts from all involved parties in the process. An efficient and targeted communication as well as a constructive co-operation will be necessary to meet all agreed targets. In particular, the cross-communication between the different Working Groups must be further improved in order to produce harmonised and coherent documents. Re-enforcing the commitments made with the adoption of the Common Implementation Strategy, a joint effort is necessary to meet the agreed deadlines, targets and ambitions for all guidance documents under finalisation
Re-organisation of working groups and new mandates for 2003 and 2004 (“follow-up strategy”)
The mandates of Working Groups 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 2.6 and 2.8 end(ed) with the finalisation of the guidance documents (latest in December 2002). At present, all groups have already identified several issues where further work on European level is necessary. In addition, the WGs which continue their work may need to re-focus their tasks and to integrate related aspects for which no other WG exists any longer (e.g. typology experts for inland and coastal waters may need to be integrated into the WG Intercalibration). Furthermore, some “new” issues were identified which might be addressed in the Common Implementation process, such as wetlands and eutrophication. On the latter, the Commission will communicate its ideas on how to link the issue to the WFD CIS process taking into account the outcome of the “Eutrophication Criteria Workshop” on 28-30 May 2002 in Brussels.