We’ve entered a strong partnership with cross-border water protection as the main goal. More precisely, climate security of lakes and rivers across the Balkan Peninsula. This collaboration marks an important step toward safeguarding shared water resources, strengthening regional cooperation, and advancing data-driven environmental protection efforts across borders.
A quadrilateral partnership has been formalised between three key national institutions in North Macedonia — the Hydrometeorological Service (HMS), the State Inspectorate for Environment and the University “St. Kliment Ohridski” – Bitola (UKLO) — and SeaCras.
This agreement marks a big step forward in aligning scientific research, satellite and AI technologies, and institutional knowledge and operative capacity for the protection of cross-border water bodies that are key resources shared among multiple countries in the Balkan region.
And the phrase ‘sharing is caring’ takes on a whole new meaning in this case:
- Both pollution and security threats are shared among countries.
- Water scarcity and climate-change boosted issues make these water reservoirs vulnerable.
This partnership aims at long-term capacity building of all partners, and its key goals are:
- transfer of knowledge based on open science policy
- technology implementation and data sharing
- high-level actionable planning of early-warning and response
- and most importantly: bringing people together for a common goal – climate security of water resources
In particular, for Balkan region, there is an urgent need for implementing a Disaster Management System for the cross – border water protection — specifically, lakes in Ohrid and Prespa region.
Aleksandar Ivanov, professor at UKLO and Mario Špadina, CEO at SeaCras
Requirements for climate security of cross-border lakes:
- First enabling system implementation and data integration;
- Implement advanced trend and risk analysis models;
- Develop a pollution source fingerprint program.
- Enabling forecasting and Early Warning Actions based on the developed forecast models for specific threats which is a base for an Early Warning System.
- Response and Mitigation actions – when a disaster is forecast or occurs, what actions and scenarios should be implemented.
This new partnership shows how cross-border collaboration, the combination of data-driven innovation, and public expertise can make a real difference in addressing today’s environmental challenges.