Saving the Baltic
Danuta Grodzicka-Kozak is the director of the Regional Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management of Gdańsk.
If you ask a Pole what the Baltic means to him, you will get a different answer each time, depending on where he lives. Some will talk of our sea with fascination as the most beautiful place on earth, full of charm, surrounded by a rich and varied landscape. For some, it is simply a place for recreation and tourist excursions, while others still regard it simply as the confluence of the Wisła, Odra and other rivers.
The Baltic is one of the most extraordinary seas in the world, slightly salty, covering an area of 415,000 square kilometers (0.4% the size of the Atlantic Ocean) with an average depth of 55 meters, connected to the ocean through the narrow straits of the Great and Little Belt and the Sound.
The determinants of the quality of the Baltic's waters include pollution brought to the sea by the rivers, directly from the seaside areas by ships and from the air above the landmasses. Playing the role of final destination for pollutants from nine highly industrialized countries is very dangerous for this fragile ecosystem, due to the long period it takes for the water from the Baltic to mix with the Atlantic Ocean.
About 85 million people work in the Baltic's drainage basin. Its population density ranges from 500 inhabitants per square kilometer in the urban areas of Germany, Poland and Denmark to fewer than 10 in the northern parts of Sweden and Finland. The seaside transport of goods plays a major role as 50 ferries are on the Baltic at any given time, and ships transport more than 500 million tons of goods each year.
In the 1970s, the problems of Baltic Sea pollution became so transparent as to induce all the countries in its basin to reduce their emissions into the air, water and soil. The Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area, which has formed the basis of trans-Baltic cooperation, was signed on March 22, 1974. Meetings of scientists from various Baltic countries have aimed to form detailed analyses of the environmental conditions of the Baltic, evaluate the changes taking place, establish who and what is responsible for the changes that have taken place, as well as suggest measures to be implemented to improve the condition of the environment.
The basic problems of Baltic environmental protection are connected to eutrophication, that is nonorganic substances (nitrates and phosphates) that are present in the seawater to such an extent as to cause the excessive growth of plants and algae. Another problem is pollution by hazardous substances, such as mercury, lead, DDTs and PCBs. Pollution from urban and industrial areas, as well as from agriculture and forestry, anti-lichen paints covering ships' hulls and illegal oil leaks all contribute to the Baltic's pollution.
How do we work together on saving the Baltic, and what is our track record on fulfilling the terms of the 1992 Baltic Sea Protection Plan regarding pollutants from land areas? As part of the program, 132 "hot spots" around the Baltic have been identified, comprising the most dangerous sources of marine environmental pollution. The list includes 37 such points in the Polish part of the basin with 18 in the Wisła drainage basin, 13 in the Odra and six in the seaside rivers' basins.
Every Pole contributes to Baltic water pollution, yet the awareness of this fact does not seem to have much influence on the decisions of municipal authorities to build wastewater treatment facilities and sewage systems. Many towns in the country's midland dump their sewage into rivers, which serve as illegal municipal garbage dumps.
The program to protect the Gdańsk and Puck Gulfs and the Baltic Sea has been among the most important priorities of all the municipalities in the Pomorskie region. These programs have received financial assistance and expertise from the National and Regional Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management, as well as EkoFundusz, which supports environmental investments.
Several wastewater facilities and sewage systems that have a direct influence on the marine conditions have been built in the Pomorskie and Zachodniopomorskie regions as part of the projects undertaken. The largest wastewater facility on the south shore of the Baltic, Gdańsk Wschód, was built because of a great commitment on the authorities' part and cost €66.4 million (zł. 287 million), which alone is enough to demonstrate the scale of the problems that local governments face. At the same time in many seaside towns and villages, kilometers of sewage facilities were built to improve the protection of the Baltic Sea.
The EkoFundusz Foundation spent some €20.8 million (zł. 90 million) in the period 1998-2002 to restrict the emissions of pollutants into the Baltic. The National Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management gave loans with a value of more than €18.5 million (zł. 80 million) for marine water protection, while the Regional Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management in Gdańsk gave more than €30.5 million (zł. 132 million) in loans for that purpose during the same period.
The result of all these efforts is that beaches are being opened, and water sports are developing on our shores. Sea trout and salmon are returning to our waters, and there are attempts to revive the seal population in this part of the Baltic. These are great achievements, especially as they have been done during a time of difficult economic transformation, when investment outlays have been very limited.
