The four riparian countries of the Sava River Basin (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Serbia) ratified the Framework Agreement on the Sava River Basin (FASRB) as a unique international agreement, which integrated many aspects of water resources management and established the International Sava River Basin Commission (ISRBC) for its implementation of the FASRB.
According to the FASRB, Article 12, “The Parties agree to develop the joint and/or integrated Plan on the management of the water resources of the Sava River Basin and to cooperate on its preparatory activities”. In the last 10 years, the Parties have cooperated in the development of many plans and programs covering navigation, water management, flood protection, etc.
The next step was to integrate climate change adaptation into the planning process of the Sava transboundary basin level. Therefore, the main conclusions of the existing studies including climate change adaptation strategies/policies at the country level needed to be embedded in a regional strategy document targeted at policymakers and practitioners of the 5 countries to provide a common orientation for actions.
The specific objectives of this assignment were:
- To develop an outline of the climate change adaptation strategy for the transboundary Sava River.
- To propose the next steps for the development of the full strategy and potential pilot priority measures for implementation.