On 16 October 2020 the 2nd National event in Serbia was organised aiming at presenting the Danube Floodplain Project results gathered so far. The event included the Ecosystem Services workshop addressing the follow-up of the first ESS setup given by related stakeholders on the 1st workshop held in January 2019.

The event was held during the COVID-19 pandemic, so all precaution measures (e.g. face masks and hand disinfectants) were taken to assure safe conditions for both the JCWI team and the audience.

Various stakeholders from the local to the national level were invited and participated in the event.

At the very beginning, JCWI reminded the audience of the general content and objectives of the Danube Floodplain Project. After that, a presentation on Floodplain Evaluation Matrix implementation for ranking and evaluation of the active floodplains was given together with results obtained for Serbian stretches of the Danube, Sava and Tisa Rivers. Also, the main idea and results of the effects of the potential floodplains – flood retentions - on the Danube, Sava and Tisa Rivers are presented.

In the following session, the Ecosystem Services principles and methods for evaluation were explained. The audience heard about how the ESS assessed at the 1st ESS Workshop were further improved and the results of the respective evaluation obtained.

A very active discussion followed both presentations showing the strong commitment of the local stakeholders to the preservation and improvement of the pilot area Begecka Jama. On the other hand, province and national stakeholders expressed more interest in the floodplains’ evaluation and ranking.

Photo gallery of the event