Flood banks are usually artificial mounds of earth built along a river. In this way, they create a larger channel for the expected flood waters and prevent them from spilling into neighboring areas. Since Poland has been struggling with floods in the south of the country for several days, the presence of such banks is worth its weight in gold. We checked how many of them have been built in recent years.
The construction of flood embankments has slowed down in recent years.
The Central Statistical Office made available last year report “Economic Aspects of Environmental Protection 2023”, which collected, among other things, data on flood embankments since 2010. Over these years, 24 to 250 km of embankments were built annually for PLN 240-939 million. Which political option built more of them?
Analyzing the data, we can calculate that in 2010, PLN 373.3 million was spent for this purpose and nearly 110 km of embankments were built. Five years later, in 2015, PLN 384 million was spent, which was used to build 240 km of embankments. However, the years 2016-2019 are noteworthy. At that time, really few embankments were built. In 2016, it was 27.3 km, in 2017 – 24.2 km, in 2018 – 43.3 km, and in 2019 – 25.4 km.
In the following years, the construction of the embankments slightly moved. In 2020, PLN 247.2 million was spent on their construction, for which 69 km of embankments were built. In 2021, the outlays increased to PLN 387.6 million, but the length of the constructed embankments dropped to 64 km. A year later, however, a record PLN 929.9 million was spent, but at the same time the length of the embankments built with these funds was “only” 50 km.
Who built more embankments – PiS or PO?
Money.pl calculated how the construction of flood embankments is distributed, taking into account political options. There is a huge gap. During the rule of Law and Justice in 2016-2019, a total of 120.2 km of flood embankments were built and modernized. In addition, 208 km were put into service from 2019 to 2023. In total, this amounts to almost 330 km of flood embankments. Meanwhile, during the rule of PO-PSL, a total of 1,731.7 km of flood embankments were built and modernized, of which 722.9 km in 2008-2011 and 1,008.8 km in 2012-2015.