Europe is running out of time to take water seriously

Mon, 30 Mar 2026 13:16:32 +0000

Anastasis Yiapanis ©EU/EESC

For decades, water policy has sat quietly in the background of European governance — technical, fragmented, often overlooked. That era is over. Today, water resilience is rapidly emerging as one of the most strategic challenges facing the continent, shaped by the accelerating pressures of climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution and unsustainable consumption. In a recent opinion adopted by the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC), the urgency of building water resilience across the continent is made unmistakably clear.