On December 7th representatives of DANUBEPARKS and the LIFE WILDisland project visited the Paradiesinsel island complex in Donau-Auen National Park, Austria.
This is among the most pristine islands in the Austrian section of the Danube, but due to river navigation infrastructure, sediments are accummulating and it is unique island chanarteristics are getting slowly lost. This is why DANUBEPARKS included this area as a project site in the recently approved "DANUBE4all - Restoration of the Danube River Basin Waters for Ecosystems and People from Mountains to Coast" project, supported within the key funding programmes for research and innovation of EU - Horizon Europe.
The project will be lead by the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Sciences, Vienna (BOKU), involving partners all along the Danube, starting in 2023. DANUBEPARKS has one of the most ambitious measures - an island restoration action in Austria and groyne adaptation actions in Hungary - Duna-Ipoly National Park, Hungary.
The actions in Donau-Auen National Park include embankment removal and adjacent side-arm opening to allow river redynamization and natural processes in the area. These measures are inspired by and directly contribute to the development of our WILDisland initiative and the LIFE project. This is an excellent example of synergy, transfer of best practices and replication between EU-funding schemes and organizations.
We are looking forward to the outcomes of both projects for setting the Danube free and letting the river do the work in restoring natural processes and landscapes!