Serbia does not have significant amounts of its own water, which makes it one of the poorer areas of Europe with the amount of 1,840 cubic meters per capita per year.
The situation is mitigated by the fact that the transit waters of the Danube and its tributaries with an average of 5,850 cubic meters per second are used at the same time, the Institute for Nature Protection of Serbia announced on the occasion of the World Water Day, on March 22.
The main resource for supplying the population and industry with water in Serbia is groundwater, which participates in the total water supply with more than 90 percent, however, they are not sufficiently used and are mostly used irrationally, the Institute said in a statement.
It is also stated that in the areas that lack scarce groundwater, river waters are increasingly used, ie waters from artificial lakes – reservoirs.
It is added that, although there are thousands of watercourses on the territory of Serbia, whose total length is 65,980 kilometers, the density of the river network is very uneven, and precipitation, as one of the most important factors of water resources, is very unevenly distributed, both territorially and throughout the year.
At the same time, as it was emphasized, the aquatic natural heritage in Serbia has been protected within the system of protected areas for more than 70 years.
“From the aspect of water protection as a natural resource, special attention is paid in Serbia to the protection of watercourses and coastal areas, wet and swampy areas, saline terrains, natural lakes and ponds. Within the protection of these natural resources, it is necessary to control the exploitation of mineral raw materials, flora and fauna,” said the director of the Institute for Nature Protection of Serbia, Aleksandar Dragisic.
He reminded that last year on the streams of Velika Morava and Zapadna Morava protected areas were declared, namely the special nature reserves “Osredak” and “Brzansko moraviste”. According to experts, about 100 species of fish live in Serbia, compared to the number of about 550 European species, the ichthyofauna of Serbia represents 20 percent of all freshwater fish species in Europe.
Rivers in Serbia are the habitat of many endangered species, such as the little crow, which is a strictly protected species in Serbia, and belongs to the group of species of international importance for protection.
The Institute also pointed out that rivers are today one of the most sensitive ecosystems in Europe.
There are a large number of threatening factors that affect rivers, such as the exploitation of river sediment (gravel), construction and expansion of infrastructure in the coastal zone, but also increasing tourist pressure on rivers, especially during the reproductive cycle of animal groups bound throughout or much of the life cycle for rivers and other aquatic ecosystems.
In 1992, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution marking March 22 each year as World Water Day, with the aim of providing access to fresh drinking water and providing basic sanitation for all, BizLife reports.
