Poland bites environmental bullet with a little help from the EU’s coffers

By Wieslaw Horabik

Date: 07/10/04

IF YOU cross one of Warsaw's bridges in the early morning hours, you will see silhouettes of men on the banks of the Vistula River with fishing rods in their hands. They do not come there to fish, but to relax and socialize.

Fish have been scarce in the Vistula for a long time as Poland suffered, like all former communist countries, from environmental neglect.

Investigations carried out after the collapse of communism in 1989 revealed that enormous damage had been inflicted on water, air and soil quality and on forests, especially surrounding the industrial centres in Upper Silesia and the Krakow region.

A 1990 report found that 65% of Poland's river water was so contaminated that it corroded equipment when used in industry.

Half of Poland's lakes had been damaged by acid rain and 95% of the country's river water was considered undrinkable. River water could not even be used for irrigation.

The rescue came late. At the end of 1990, Western banks began opening credit lines for Polish environmental protection. But the real blessing came from Poland's accession negotiations with the EU. The country was included in the Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession programme (ISPA) financing environmental and transport projects in accession countries.

The value of contracts concluded within the framework of ISPA will exceed €1 billion this year. Next year the sum is expected to double.

Some 43 projects have already been granted funds from the programme. The first has already been completed - a water purification plant in Olsztyn, eastern Poland. The government plans to build such plants and sewage systems for 2.7bn zlotys (0.5bn euro) yearly.

Several major Polish construction firms are to participate in the programme's implementation since investments in ecology mean a prospective boom for the construction sector.

According to the official estimates, environment projects will create some 55,000 new jobs between now and 2015 in the administration and maintenance of the new complexes.

The World Wide Fund for Nature estimates that new EU states will particularly benefit from the programme of the development of renewable energy.

During the transitional periods, Poland should achieve 7.5% of the market share in this energy by 2010.

Companies from the most energy-consuming sectors of the economy will have to invest in cutting emission of air-polluting gases, sulphur and hydrogen. Polish companies have already concluded contracts for desulphurization of exhaust gases for €62.9m.

The investment in environment protection increased by 4% last year and in water conservation by 17%.

The ecological demands, however, are still great.

Poland committed itself to comply fully with the EU directive on municipal waste treatment by 2015. The directive imposes severe standards for waste channelled into the natural environment in "especially sensitive" regions. The whole territory of Poland has been declared as such.

The directive requires that treatment plants which absorb phosphorus and hydrogen compounds should be built in all towns with a population exceeding 15,000. According to data from the ministry of environment, 1,378 such settlements are covered by the regulation and only in 310 of them do the treatment plants fulfil the EU norms.

The sewage treatment plants in the remaining settlements require modernization and expansion.

In 161 settlements there are neither sewage systems nor treatment plants at all. The government has launched a programme regulating municipal wastes treatment and its funding constitutes the major item in the budget of local communities. The ministry assesses the costs of adjusting the municipal water and sewage treatment systems to EU demands at more than €10bn.

There is a growing public awareness in the country of the importance of protecting the environment.

Most leading newspapers and TV stations devote time and space to ecological issues. Each locality now has a special unit dealing with the protection of nature. The number of eco-farms has nearly doubled in 2004 from the previous year. A growing number of Polish farmers see their chance of competing in the EU single market in the area of eco-products. Eco-tourism is also developing rapidly.

The European Commission has estimated that the overall costs of implementing EU environment rules in Poland lie at between €22.1-42.8bn. But profits from this process have been assessed at €41-208bn.

One day, perhaps, the anglers from Warsaw will be able to catch fish.

• Wieslaw Horabik is a freelance journalist based in Poland.

Article reports on Poland's problems with the implementation of EU environment rules.

Poland: Ministry of the Environment: Homepage http://www.mos.gov.pl/index_main.shtml

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