ICPR – International Commission for the Protection of the Rhine

201. Report issued by the President of the ICPR 2011 - 2012

Balance of the present state of the Rhine and its catchment – joint progress report for 2012/2013 
As decided by the Strategy Group, a „Balance on the progress made due to improvements of the state of the Rhine and its catchment" will be drawn in the beginning of 2013.
This report will present progress made and will be published on the occasion of the planned conference of ministers. The most important results and trends of the chemical and biological surveys of water quality will be presented in easy to understand graphs and/or tables and show the effects of all restoration measures implemented along the Rhine and in its catchment. Also, progress made in the field of flood protection and findings on the effects of climate change for water resources management will be presented. The Small Strategy Group (SG-K) is in charge of drafting this balance.

Further coordinated implementation of the WFD: Update of the inventory according to the WFD
Additionally, the ICPR Strategy Group has defined the orientation and workload in connection with updating the inventory according to the WFD. Based on the plan of the inventory so far, the basic update need has been described. It has been determined, which working group is to do what work and by when and what maps have to be updated. The Small Strategy Group (SG-K) is equally in charge of updating the inventory.

Coordinated implementation of the Floods Directive in the IRBD Rhine
The first step of implementation according to the Floods Directive, the determination of flood risk areas in the IRBD Rhine has, for the time being, been accomplished by end 2011 with a report coordinated within the ICPR and two survey maps and was published on the ICPR website <link http: www.iksr.org>www.iksr.org by mid January 2012. Information not yet integrated into this report will presumably be available by the end of October 2012.
The next steps within the implementation of the Floods directive concern the establishing of flood hazard and flood risk maps for all previously defined flood risk areas in the IRBD Rhine (part A, catchment > 2,500 km²). In this connection, the ICPR Rhine Atlas published for the main stream of the Rhine on a scale 1 : 100,000 will be updated and extended by the Alpine Rhine, Lake Constance, Lake IJssel and the coastal areas. This enables a uniformed representation of flood hazards and flood risks along the entire main stream of the Rhine.