The settlements situated in the upper basins of the Prut and Siret Rivers will be protected from floods through the EAST AVERT crossborder project between Romania, Ukraine and Moldova, to the value of €2.2 million. The funds will be provided by the European Neighborhood and Partnership Instrument through the Joint Operational Program Romania-Ukraine-Republic of Moldova, IPN reports, quoting a communiqué from the Ministry of the Environment.
“When the project is implemented, the waters between Romania-Ukraine-Moldova will be managed sustainably, by improving data collection and transfer so as to intervene swiftly in emergencies, reduce the damage and protect the local communities from the basins of the Prut and Siret, in the border areas,” Minister of the Environment Gheorghe Salaru said in the project launch in Chisinau.
Adriana Doina Pana, Minister Delegate for Water, Forests and Fisheries at the Romanian Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change, said the project aims to reduce the vulnerability of the communities from the border areas exposed to flood risks by carrying out upgrading works on the Stanca-Costesti hydrological complex and improving the warning system by installing monitoring equipment in the Siret and Prut river basins.
For the EAST AVERT project to be implemented, a common database must be created to enable the identification and representation of the flooded areas and to modernize the harmonized hydrological information and warning system for protecting border areas. The project will last for 22 months.
