AMEWAM - Agricultural measures for water management and their integration into spatial planning

The two key problems to be addressed are the following

• surface water runoff and soil erosion leading to flood damage and
• decrease of water retention capacity of soils in small catchment areas.

In all partner areas, there have been problems with recent rainfall events giving rise to rapid water runoff from arable fields either directly into residential areas or into river systems that subsequently flood downstream. The levels of runoff have also contributed to soil erosion that reduces agricultural productivity and, in some cases brings soil onto roads and into residential areas.

"AMEWAM" aims to tackle these problems through agricultural measures (e.g. mulch seeding) that will "hold the water up on the land" to limit surface water runoff and erosion and reduce the need of engineering based solutions. Effectiveness and costs of those agricultural measures will be analysed and evaluated.