Overall, the conclusions of the 2019 Fitness Check of Directives 2000/60/EC, 2006/118/EC, 2007/60/EC and 2008/105/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (the Fitness Check) indicate that those Directives are broadly fit for purpose, with some scope for improvement. The conclusions indicate that those Directives have so far generally led to a higher level of protection of water bodies and better flood risk management. However, they also point out that currently more than half of all European water bodies are subject to exemptions under Directive 2000/60/EC, which indicates that Member States face a very substantial challenge to achieve the objective of good water status, and in particular to comply with the environmental quality standards (EQS) for priority substances, within the given deadlines. In addition, the Fitness Check concluded that the slow progress made as regards achieving the objectives of those Directives can, amongst other things, be attributed to slow implementation, in part due to a lack of sufficient financial resources as well as insufficient integration of environmental objectives into sectoral legislation.
Text as published in the Official Journal, reproduced verbatim (including any typographical quirks of the source). For the authentic version, see EUR-Lex.
