CAMARO-D: Transnationale Management-Erfahrungen hinsichtlich Landnutzungseinflüsse auf das Wasserregime im Donauraum - Projekt in Interreg Danube

Existing land use activities – comprising agriculture, grassland management, forestry and urbanization – as well as the vegetation cover have great influences on the water regime and water resources of river catchment areas in a qualitative and quantitative manner. Depending on the intensity or method of cultivation and utilisation - respectively according to the percentage of suitable, site-adapted vegetation cover along rivers or torrents and their catchments - the extent of erosion, floods, soil compaction, surface-runoff and water pollution is significant. Due to uncertain trends concerning climate change and its consequences in the future, these interdependences between land use respectively vegetation cover and different types of water resources are difficult to predict and could even boost actual problems through increased droughts, strong precipitation events and expansion of invasive plant species.
These Danube basin-wide challenges ask for a coordinated transnational cross-sector approach towards an optimal land use management respectively vegetation cover within relevant river catchment areas. It will provide sustainable protection of water resources and improved flood prevention for safeguarding urbanised areas. This can only happen through improved infiltration and water storage as well as mitigation of erosion processes and floods. Also other natural hazards like mudflow or debris wood flow can be tackled by Danube river basin-wide measures that clearly envisage such changes.

A transnational catchment-based “Land Use Development Plan” (LUDP) will offer a new planning instrument for an adequate coordination and harmonization of different function-oriented sustainable land use management activities. It shall guarantee both sustainable protection of water resources and improved flood risk prevention by fostering an advanced trans-sector and transnational cooperation of key stakeholders, initiated by the project and maintained beyond. It is also foreseen to be integrated in existing River Basin Management Plans, which facilitate the implementation of related regulations and common interventions.
To guarantee the feasibility and effectiveness of this unprecedented developed instrument, its operational implementation will be initiated and tested in practice within envisaged Pilot Actions respectively Pilot Areas. Within the Pilot Actions newly developed best practices in function-oriented sustainable land use management, considering climate change, are tested and documented. They will be clustered according to their interdependences of land use and vegetation cover respectively, dealing with three different types of water resources (groundwater, torrents and rivers) and are chosen after a thorough strategic drafting process with a strong participatory approach based on numerous cross-sector stakeholder workshops respectively trainings and feedback processes.
For relevant stakeholders and decision-makers an innovative transnational guidance (GUIDR) will be developed as a practically oriented decision support tool. It will encompass a set of best practices for steering function-oriented land use activities and management, in order to safeguard water resources and reduce flood risks in the respective river catchment areas. Supported by intensive stakeholder workshops and trainings, the initiation of the practical GUIDR implementation will be conducted within the pilot areas in order to mitigate the different conflicts of interest and to develop prospects for essential actions.
As LUDP demonstrates procedures for a sound water management on a transnational basis, it provides important inputs for the further development of EUSDR (EU Strategy for the Danube Region) and other relevant policies. The cooperation of various stakeholders within CAMARO-D will serve as a blueprint for policy development and can be a model for similar cooperation processes in other thematic fields in the EU.

Der Hauptfokus von CAMARO-D liegt in der Entwicklung eines neuartigen transnationalen Ansatzes eines sogenannten “Land-Entwicklungs-Planes” (LUDP) bezogen auf Flusseinzugsgebiete und einer dementsprechenden Strategie zur Implementierung dieses Instrumentes. In Anlehnung an den österreichischen „Waldentwicklungsplan“, der eine Priorisierung der verschiedenen Waldfunktionen je nach standörtlichen Gegebenheiten und die daraus abgeleiteten notwendigen Maßnahmen zur nachhaltigen Sicherung und Verbesserung der Waldwirkungen vorgibt, soll dieser neu entwickelte Plan Vorgaben zur allgemeinen nachhaltigen Landnutzung im Einzugsgebiet von verschiedenen Wasserressourcen liefern (Verschneidung der Bereiche Land- und Forstwirtschaft, Wasserwirtschaft und Raumplanung). Dadurch sollen gleich mehrere derzeit auftretende Probleme – wie Zunahme des Oberflächenabflusses und der damit einhergehenden Bodenerosion, Überflutungen, Bodenverdichtungen, Verunreinigungen, invasive Pflanzenarten - teilweise hervorgerufen bzw. verstärkt durch ungeeignete Bewirtschaftungsmaßnahmen - vermindert werden. Dies bedarf jedoch einer intensiven Kooperation nicht nur zwischen den unterschiedlichen Fachdisziplinen, sondern auch zwischen verschiedenen Landnutzern und Verwaltungsebenen. Die Erfahrungen, die im Rahmen von CAMARO-D gesammelt werden, und die neu entwickelten „Best Practice“-Beispiele in den jeweiligen Pilotgebieten fließen ein in zukünftige nationale Strategien in Richtung einer optimalen forstlichen Bewirtschaftung innerhalb von Wassereinzugsgebieten, die wiederum in den österreichischen Gewässerbewirtschaftungsplänen Berücksichtigung finden sollen.
- Verschneidung mit dem Programm Ländliche Entwicklung 2014-2020
- Einbettung in die transnationale Donau-Strategie
- Grundlage für Entscheidungsträger auf lokaler, regionaler, nationaler Ebene