Speech of Prime Minister Edi Rama in the presentation of the “EU Floods Recovery Programme’’, in Novoselë, Vlorë:

A year has not passed yet since, together with the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, with MPs of the area and the business community, we became part of a very serious commitment in the face of the consequences of a very serious flood. This commitment was different from the other times when certain areas in Albania were flooded, because we didn’t consider it enough to be back when the sun came out and we were not satisfied only with the first aid of the tough days and nights, but we committed to thoroughly implement a comprehensive plan of return to normality, with a view not only to repair the damage caused to the families of all the area, but also to take concrete measures through a program of investments in infrastructure so that we will be able to face floods that will surely come in the future.

Here we are here today and it is a sunny day, to convey the message that the last part of our commitment is being materialized. The Minister recalled that we have made since the very beginning an unusual effort to return 100% of what people lost, every cattle and every chicken. Actually, we returned 100% of them.

In addition, we engaged to take concrete measures and facilitate the relations between lending agencies and damaged farmers. We did this too.

Also, differently from what was preached with much ado during the days of flood by those who were trying to have their benefits even in the days of flood, we engaged directly with the European Union who actually not only took very seriously our request, but also engaged very seriously to identify the damages and supported us with substantial funding in two respects.

On the one hand in terms of reconstruction, but with completely new infrastructure standards, such as the project that we have here before us, and a number of other projects in the areas of Armen, Bishti i Malit and Selenicë-Armen, in the areas Horë and Kallarat, Vranisht, in the area of Ceprat, Risili and Ceprat-Dheu i Bardhë, in the areas of Bishan, Mifol, here, Fitore and Novoselë, in the areas of Çervë, Mashkullore, Palokastër and Shtupezi, in the areas of Gerhot and Valaresë bridge, in Vashtëmisë and also in the Lagoon of Nartë in Akërni. A chain of infrastructure projects which will guarantee a much higher durability face to natural disasters.

But not only that. On the other hand it is also about financial compensations for all those farmers who lost their crops, in addition to supporting them through a project that has been already completed for the reconstruction of a number of greenhouses that were completely destroyed on those days.

Between 1998 and 2009, Europe suffered over 213 major floods, including the catastrophic floods along the Danube and Elbe rivers in the summer of 2002. These floods affected more seriously countries that were more developed and more organized than Albania, causing 1.126 deaths and forced displacement of approximately half a million people, with a calculated loss of 52 billion Euros.

And of course, in addition to the direct economic and social damage, floods have serious environmental consequences. The flooding led to a new level Europe’s awareness and its internal organization to enhance interoperability and increase solidarity. According to the European Environmental Agency, annual river flows are increasing in northern Europe and decreasing in the south, ad this trend is expected to increase in the future to due global warming. Major changes in seasonality that have affected also Albania, are expected to have lower flows in the summer and higher flows in the winter and, as a result, drought is expected to grow especially in Southern and Eastern Europe, where we are, especially in the summer, of course. While floods are expected to occur more frequently in river basins, especially in winter and spring.

Floods are natural phenomena in front of which we can do nothing, but through appropriate measures we can reduce or limit their impact. In fact, unlike other countries, for the sake of truth, besides objective reasons related to global warming and all that I said above, in Albania also we face some objective consequences of the subjective reasons that led to policies destructive to the environment, arable land and people left at the mercy of fate were not only prevented, but were encouraged to build on riverbeds. Something that never occurred to our ancestors and the ancestors our ancestors, even though back then they were much less informed and much more isolated. However, they never went built on the riverbanks, drainage canals, and on places where you cannot joke with nature, and where any investment not only is taken away by the river, but can turn into a disaster translated into loss of human lives. Albanians waited for the democracy to come to do this, totally blind and led blindly by the slogan “Constructing is abundance. Build wherever you can, and you’ll have abundance and life will be more beautiful.”

On the other hand, there is another major consequence which we have to face, and it translates directly into insolvency that doesn’t allow us to cope with the consequences of the confusion caused in all these years that we passed through as a transition to democracy; but beyond the financial concern, it is due to the lack of sustainability of our state organization system. We have given this a new opportunity with the territorial and administrative reform in relation to which, starting from next year, we will make a reasonable division of tasks and responsibilities. This means that drainage boards, which in my view, are structures that have failed and that have a great responsibility, of course within the modest framework of their means, for everything that has happened or has not been stopped from happening, will be radically reformed. They will be radically reformed and responsibility will be shared between what the government will assume as a national responsibility, and what municipalities will assume as local responsibility. Unlike what has been done in the past where decentralization has only been on paper, we have ready a radical reform to transfer under the local government’s responsibility not only a large part of the labor force in drainage boards, and a considerable part of the irrigation and drainage arteries, but also to provide as never before financial support to clean all drainage and irrigation canals, which have not been touched by anybody in 25 years. And every municipality has them, ranging from municipalities where agriculture is the most important human activity to the municipalities where it may be less important, but where it is of great importance for tens of thousand people.

Our target is to fulfill the commitment we have made to bring water to each parcel where people work or might work. The commitment to clean a significant number of canals in the area of Myzeqe, where no work has been done for 25 years, has resulted into an exponential increase in exports. Just because of the water! Wherever we have been, in every campaign, every meeting, in rural areas, the main concern is water. Water to work the land, along with the need to build canals to prevent floods.

Next year will be a historic year in this regard. Municipalities will engage all their efforts and financial support to clean most of the irrigation and drainage channels, them, not to say all of them, for which they will have our support. Meanwhile, led by the Ministry of Agriculture, the government will focus on main highways, pumping stations, large tanks, river discharges, in order to make there strategically important investments.

Let me thank the European Union, and I am very happy that sometimes I am given the opportunity to thank it with all my heart, for in many cases I do it merely with logic. In this case I thank the European Union wholeheartedly, because it has supported not only with money but also with the human resources the realization of this project. Without the solidarity of the European Union, that we see and what we do not see, but which is being built in all the areas I mentioned, would have been simply impossible. Just as, without the solidarity of the European Union it would have been absolutely impossible to launch a new mechanism to warn of natural disasters and to take to another level the knowledge on these phenomena. Just as without the European Union it would have been impossible for us today to be ready to compensate businesses affected by the floods. And here we have a co-financing of the European Union with the Albanian government.

I want also to thank you from the heart the UNDP which manages very qualitatively this huge infrastructure project, and I thank also the UNDP representative for being here, since she is from our parts, she comes from Turkey, she understand our problems better than many others in the European Union can understand them.

4.083 farmers affected by the flood will be compensated. The impact of the overall investment will be such that, according specialist of the European Union in cooperation with our specialists, will have a better impact in the life of approximately 160 thousand inhabitants, and will have as direct beneficiaries over 20 thousand inhabitants.

In conclusion, I want to tell everyone that it is not possible for Albania, the Albanian state, the Albanian state budget, including the solidarity of the European Union, to afford financially any damage in the future that comes as a result of the nonsense constructions on river beds and drainage canals.

Just as it is not possible for governments or municipalities, today and tomorrow, to afford floods in building garages transformed illegally into shops according to totally unacceptable and illegal situations the urban point of view. Not to mention those who meet legal requirements. This means that we must enter into a new phase, just as everybody does in normal Europe, and people must be insured. Businesses, first of all, must be insured in view of the floods. There is a concrete case of a business up in the north that is insured and has benefited every penny, all the money for compensation of damages from the insurance company. We should extend further this culture and this method. It is impossible to build haphazardly, without thinking to isolate, to protect, to cope with a natural phenomenon, and when water comes, go out and cry “Where is the state?” We are the state, all together, and everyone has a role. The state is not the mother who has a duty to prepare food three times a day, regardless of what you are doing. This is not possible!

I said this not for what is gone, but for what may come. It is very important for you to be aware that we cannot cope with problems only when they show up. Just as everyone should do their own part, without a doubt, the government has the large burden to do the right thing for everyone. I am very pleased that in this aspect, for the first time, an Albanian government is doing the right thing. We have been chasing the flood issue for a whole year. Meanwhile, last year we compensated for the flooding of the past years in the plain areas of Shkodra. It was not little money, but a mountain of debt that the previous government has left to people. They were millions of Euros.

Thank you very much!

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Albania receives approximately 16 million euros from the “EU Floods Recovery Programme’’, to improve the risk management and prevent flooding in the future.

The program has two objectives: recovery the areas affected by the floods occurred in February this year, and improve the capacity to prevent and respond to similar situations.

This program will compensate 4083 farmers for the damage that was caused during the floods of February this year and, while business affected by the floods in February will receive grants for investment worth 7.1 million Euros, co-financed by the EU and the government of Albania.

Two other components of the program are the construction of protection infrastructure in areas affected by the floods of February, with an investment of 6.3 million Euros, and the launch of a mechanism to warn of natural disasters, with an investment of 2.5 million euros by the European Union.