The 3rd FLOOD-WISE Political Expert Forum (PEF) was held in Ljubljana on the 20th of April 2012.
The European Union promotes the sharing of expertise to solve common problems. The FLOOD-WISE project will enable policy makers to share information and best practice in flood management strategy with their counterparts across Europe and now they are looking for solutions to help Slovenia and Croatia.
»The subject of the 3rd PEF was the cross border flood risk management plans, including cross border measures and solution. The PEF has been preceded by a mini conference on “Spatial planning in Floodplains and inundation management” with a number of interesting presentations, including themes like “room for the river “, “innovative measures”, “cultural and ecological heritage” and “use of retention areas”.
After the mini conference the 3rd version of the FLOOD-WISE Project Statement has been presented, extended with the latest insights learned from all three phases of the project, from the inventory and assessment of flood risks, through making flood risk maps to defining the solutions and measures to deal with the floods, included in a flood risk management plan. This living document will form the basis of the Final Report of FLOOD-WISE which will be published in October 2012.
In the PEF, participants from Poland, Hungary, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Germany and the International Sava River Basin Commission shared their opinion on a number of statements selected from the Project Statement. This forms a good starting point for lively discussions from various perspectives and at the same time will provide the FLOOD-WISE project partners with valuable feedback on their work so far.
The PEF has been moderated by an experienced flood risk manager, Dr. Luitzen Bijlsma from the Netherlands, who is Co-Coordinator of the National Flood Protection Programme and the National Governance Treaty in the Netherlands.«
Kristijan Novak, vodja investicij
Občina Rogaška Slatina