To remedy this situation, the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe is joining forces with the World Health Organization, the United Nations Environment Programme and others to cut pollution, improve the quality of aquatic ecosystems, and protect human health and safety. Their aim is to submit an international instrument to address the problem of water-related diseases for adoption at the Ministerial Conference on Environment and Health in London in 1999. Their first intergovernmental meeting to draw up this agreement is scheduled to take place in Budapest from 11 to 13 February 1998. The wastage of water and the ever-increasing consumption have an enormous impact on the environment. Eventually, they could be a source of disputes between countries over transboundary waters.
Many cities depend heavily on water from transboundary rivers.
A number of European countries abstract at least as much surface water as they generate. Ten receive more than half their total water resources from neighbouring countries. Five others, with large rivers, receive more than three quarters of their water from river flows from upstream countries. The need for more water has also led to an overuse of shallow groundwater resources and water abstraction from deep aquifers around cities. Safeguard Water Resources Mr. B rlund stressed that it was high time that European cities started taking the management of water resources seriously.