Düsseldorf (dpa / lnw) - Before the anniversary of the flood and flood disaster in North Rhine-Westphalia, the Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland (BUND) is calling for an "immediate program for ecological flood protection". The NRW state government must present an "unembellished cause analysis and balance sheet" and implement precautionary measures, the environmental organization announced on Sunday.
In the flood disaster on July 14 and 15, 2021, which happened a year ago in just a few days, 49 people died in NRW alone. Clean-up and reconstruction work is still ongoing in the affected areas. "But otherwise "business as usual" seems to be returning," criticized the BUND state chairman of North Rhine-Westphalia, Holger Sticht. "A fundamental reorientation of politics with regard to precautionary ecological flood protection is not in sight."
According to him, the new black-green state government is not planning to anchor preventive flood protection as a binding goal in the state development plan. In the coalition agreement, no hard brake on land use was created. There are also no concrete specifications for an ecological forest policy, and water protection is only considered a marginal issue, criticized Sticht. "The parliamentary investigative committee set up to deal with the flood disaster has revealed the full extent of the system failure.
