Seasonal rivers, water shortages, power outages and high food prices are becoming a realistic scenario for Poland

Many Polish regions suffer from water shortages. High temperatures, lack of sufficient amount of rainfall as well as mismanagement of the available supplies have caused a drastic drop in water level in many rivers. For instance, Olza River water level in Cieszyn on Monday was only 6 cm. The problem has also affected Poland's longest river - the Vistula.

"It's hardly surprising (hydrological situation in Poland - edit.), because we have an ever more severe drought, we have global warming, whose effects are ever more intensive. So this is a situation which we should be expecting to continue in the coming years, maybe it will be even worse," freshwater conservation specialist from WWF Alicja Pawelec told TVN24.

The expert - who was a guest of a morning show in TVN24 on Tuesday - said that in order to save the dropping amount of water, proper systemic changes should be implemented as soon as possible.

"Obviously, on the level of an ordinary citizen, we should be saving water, collect rainwater. However, in this case an ordinary citizen isn't enough. Systemic changes are in order here, we should restore our rivers as soon as possible, as 90% of our rivers are in terrible condition and require immediate action," Pawelec said. "We should start to restore them systemically as soon as possible, renaturalise, bring back floodplains and wetlands, so as to catch the water in the parts of landscape where it falls, and not to let escape like it has been to this day," she said.

A document titled "The National River Renaturalisation Plan" has been published already two years ago. It mentions all Polish rivers and necessary action needed to be taken in each one, including estimated costs. However, since that time nothing has been done to improve Poland's hydrological situation. As Pawelec points out, it is not clear why the government still haven't implemented their plans despite the ever more severe drought.

"This is a matter of changing our way of thinking when it comes to our water management. So far, we've been focusing on removing excess amounts of water. It (the water - edit.) used to be a problem so we would deepen the rivers, straighten the riverbeds to make it flow to the Baltic as soon as possible. At this point we are in a completely different place in history and we need to keep this water, which means we must reorganise the country's whole water supply system. Unfotunately, as of yet no such will is to be seen when it comes to those in power and the state administration. We can still see them following the same old outdated trend, when we have excess of water," she argued.

If we don't act now, in a decade or two we will have seasonal rivers in Poland. Water will cease to flow uninterrupted, and rivers will run seasonally. "The system will be simply dying out. For us it will result in disruptions in drinking water supplies, if the intake is in the river. It may mean power outages, if a power plant uses river water for cooling. So these are real consequences for us plus the question of food prices increase, because if such rivers don't irrigate the area, we have a bigger drought, damaged crops, and this in turn results in increasing food prices," Alicja Pawelec said.

Some 300 municipalities across the country have issued calls to save water due to a serious hydrological situation. According to the WWF expert, it is hard to say whether the appeals will spark positive responses, but it is still important to speak about, to educate people and make them aware of how scarce are our water supplies.

"The citizens are starting to notice it. Farmers are obviously the first to notice as they experience troubles with their crops. But also people in the cities are beginning to see it, if only in the level of waters in our area. Therefore, the more education and discussion about this problem, the more effective these calls, as people will understand why they (the calls - edit.) are issued and what for," she explained.

Alicja Pawelec stressed that the concerns regarding the availability of tap water were very much justifed, adding that the ultimate decisions would have be taken by local authorites.

"Like for instance in Skierniewice two years ago, when there was no water in the taps because the city had a surface water intake, but in the case of Warsaw, which has a ground water intake, such scenario is rather unlikely yet," she added.