Floods are addressed in the Danube River Protection Convention which emphasizes the need for transboundary cooperation in dealing with such undesirable events. Under the Convention, the competent authorities should collaborate to establish joint emergency plans for responding to floods. The ICPDR has gone a step further to include flood prevention in its Joint Action Programme (2001-2005). As part of the implementation of this Programme, the first expert meeting of the ICPDR on flood protection was held in Budapest in September 2001. At the meeting, the Danube countries’ hydrology experts agreed on the need to develop an action programme for sustainable flood prevention in the Danube River Basin.
The recent floods in the Elbe River Basin have highlighted another problem associated with overflow: the inundation of landfills, dump sites and storage facilities containing harmful substances. The possibility of these substances being transported into the water poses a clear threat to the environment, as was demonstrated by Spolana chemical plant at Neratovice in the Czech Republic in August 2002. Such potential threats were recognized by the ICPDR in the past and already in the spring of 2002 the Danube countries agreed to prepare an inventory of old contaminated sites in potentially flooded areas in the Danube River Basin.
The recent floods in Central Europe have also highlighted the need to review the Common Implementation Strategy of the EU Water Framework Directive in a way to pay special attention to flood issues in developing river basin management plans. In this respect, particular consideration should be given to the role of "Heavily Modified Water Bodies" (as defined by the EU Water Framework Directive), water balance, flow regulation and land use patterns (wetland restoration). The ICPDR, too, will address floods and flood-related issues in its own Danube River Basin Management Plan.