Some Aspects of Reforming the Water Management System and Efficient Use of Reclaimed Lands in Ukraine

The necessity and the basic directions of the scientific vision of further reforming the systems of water resources and land reclamation management are determined. The need for such a reform is dictated by the fact that, despite the adoption on October 4, 2016, by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine of the Law "On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine on Implementing Integrated Approaches to Basin Management" and a number of by-laws, the system of water management and land reclamation management in Ukraine still remains virtually unreformed since post-Soviet times as two mutually exclusive functions remain in this system: the water management function and the land reclamation management function. Moreover, the statutory grounds for the introduction of integrated basin management have been deliberately used to eliminate economic entities which managed reclamation infrastructure, which has made it much more difficult to separate the above-mentioned functions, as required by Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of Europe “On establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy”, the implementation of which into Ukrainian law is a mandatory task under the Association Agreement with the EU. Recent adoption (on February 17, 2022) by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine of the Law “On Organization of Water Users and Stimulation of Hydrotechnical Land Reclamation” was confirmed by the President of Ukraine on May 6, 2022. It is an important step towards reforming the water management as for the first time in Ukraine the law introduces a new organizational and legal form for the management of reclamation systems, namely water user organizations. But this Law does not address the main issue of the reform - the separation of the above-mentioned functions. Therefore, the success of further reforming of the systems of water resources and land reclamation management will directly depend not on the speed of development and adoption of bylaws to the Law “On Organization of Water Users and Stimulation of Hydrotechnical Land Reclamation”. It will depend on the earliest possible adoption of the “Concept of reforming the water management system of Ukraine” by the Government of Ukraine, the project of which was prepared and approved by all interested ministries and departments in 2019, but was deliberately blocked by then leaders of the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources of Ukraine. Therefore, the work on reforming the systems of water resources and land reclamation management is unsystematic and, in many cases, the practical steps being implemented, especially in improving the structure of the State Agency Water Resources of Ukraine, are mostly destructive. Minimizing their negative impact will require considerable efforts and time. This article aims at scientific substantiation of the list and sequence of measures, including at the legislative level, the implementation of which will bring the systems of water resources and land reclamation management in Ukraine in line with European water legislation, and thus ensure full implementation of the provisions of integrated management on the basin principle not only formally but also in the spirit.