December the 6th, 2024 – Croatia is set to invest a massive 2 billion euros in flood defence, with a particular focus on three areas of the country.
As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marija Brnic writes, by the year 2030, Croatia intends to provide around 2 billion euros for flood defence and water damage projects, as well as irrigation projects.
The majority, around 1.6 billion euros, will be invested in flood protection. Minister Marija Vučković recently presented the Multi-annual Programme for the Construction of Regulatory and Protective Water Structures and Land Reclamation Structures, where she revealed that a total of 294 new projects are planned. They’re mostly in the Danube and Sava river basins, as well as in the southern Adriatic basins.
Individually speaking, the most valuable financial investments will be poured into projects in the wider Karlovac area, where almost 227 million euros are being planned by Croatia for flood defence for the coming period. Larger projects have also been prepared for Ogulin, where around 16 million euros will be invested in flood defence.
One of the more significant projects is being planned for the extreme south of Croatia, more specifically in the Neretva region. There, protection measures against water salinisation will be implemented. This has been a problem for a long time for this region of Croatia, because the intrusion of salt from the sea is increasingly affecting agricultural production. An investment of 73.5 million euros is planned for that project.
Croatia is facing increasing problems owing to torrents. The current assessments that their frequency and intensity will increase as a result of climate change is pushing policymakers to make changes. In order to provide protection against stormwater in urban areas, rising sea levels and flooding at the mouths of watercourses, projects on flood protection are also being planned.
In addition to the 19 projects currently underway, another 129 projects are planned by 2030, mostly in the Upper Sava area, 77 of them in total. The plan includes protecting Požega from torrents, regulating torrents in Podgora, and regulating the Sukošan stream and its tributary Debeljak.
The plan is also to construct eight reservoirs and five retention ponds, as well as to reconstruct nine retention ponds. Croatia plans to pour approximately 400 million euros into public irrigation projects in addition to flood defence projects.
