Pro Danube International takes action on fairway problems suggesting an EC-led task force to implement emergency measures and to ensure safe navigation.

Several years of inadequate waterway maintenance combined with delays in the execution of important river engineering projects have led to significant fairway problems. Some waterway administrations obviously struggle with insufficient financial and technical resources reducing the fairway depth to an inefficient and unsafe level. The low water seasons of last autumn revealed the failure in infrastructure maintenance and resulted in losses to the tune of millions of euros for the navigation industry and its customers.

Pro Danube International takes action on behalf of its members and approaches the European Commission and the national governments to call in a task force and to co-ordinate emergency measures. In this task force the waterway administrations of the Danube region shall provide a conclusive plan and deliver measures to ensure safe and cost-effective navigation on the Danube again.

Important industries in the Danube region depend on reliable and efficient transport of their goods on the Danube like the steel industry, the agribusiness and the oil industry. Further and long-term limitations in draught will result in higher logistics costs endangering competitiveness thereby putting many jobs at risk  in the face of a pending economic recession.

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