In a coun­try which lies large­ly below sea lev­el, water man­age­ment is a cru­cial aspect of life. The Dutch have been experts in keep­ing their feet dry ever since they set­tled in the marshy lands sur­round­ing the Rhine delta. To pro­tect against flood­ing, the Nether­lands has devel­oped an advanced sys­tem of dikes, dams, and flood­gates. Today, the coun­try is at the fore­front of mod­ern and con­tem­po­rary water man­age­ment prac­tices, which are essen­tial to pro­tect against the grow­ing threat of cli­mate change and sea lev­el rise.

Since the real­iza­tion of the Delta Works, a large sys­tem of dams, dykes, locks and storm surge bar­ri­ers in the South­west of the coun­try, the seafront is con­sid­ered safe. The Delta Works were built in response to the dev­as­tat­ing 1953 North Sea flood, which killed over 1,800 peo­ple and caused wide­spread dam­age. They rep­re­sent a com­pre­hen­sive approach to water man­age­ment that aims to improve flood pro­tec­tion, ensure suf­fi­cient fresh­wa­ter sup­ply, and enhance spa­tial plan­ning in the face of cli­mate change. The pro­gramme includes a range of mea­sures, such as strength­en­ing dikes and sea walls, cre­at­ing new nature reserves to buffer against flood­ing, and improv­ing the man­age­ment of riv­er systems.

Today, a big­ger chal­lenge than hor­i­zon­tal water is ver­ti­cal water: salty ground­wa­ter push­ing through the pold­ers, but main­ly the increase in pre­cip­i­ta­tion due to the cli­mate change. There­fore an impor­tant aspect of Dutch water man­age­ment are nature-based solu­tions. These are sus­tain­able and cost-effec­tive mea­sures that har­ness the pow­er of nature to mit­i­gate the effects of cli­mate change and pro­tect against flooding.