Month: December 2021

Currently in Serbia, only 10% of the population is covered by some degree of wastewater treatment. The goal of the “Clean Serbia” Project, the presentation for which was made in the Chamber of Commerce, is for 80% of the population to be covered.

The “Clean Serbia” Project will cover 2.5 million people in Serbia in 69 units of Local Government

The “Clean Serbia” Project is being realised by the Ministry of Construction of the Republic of Serbia, units of Local Government and the company CRBC.

“This Project is for the future of our country, our people and our children. We do not have the right to push this problem under the rug. We are currently discharging the biggest amounts of waste into our rivers, and later take water for drinking from those same rivers. It is high time to protect our natural resources. We can and must challenge the status quo and that is why we are investing 4 billion EUR in order to construct 700 km of sewage network and save our rivers. Not for us, but for our children. Solving this problem will not be easy nor it will be cheap, and we unfortunately do not have examples of good practice in our country and that is why we need everyone who understands the gist of the problem and who wants to contribute. To be honest, people reach better to roads and fast motorways but we have to solve this problem quickly because it is not the matter of populism but the matter of urgent need.” says the Minister of Construction Tomislav Momirović.

The Project plans for the construction of over 5,206,679.31 meters of sewage network, and the number of plants is almost the half of what is needed for the whole Serbia, 165 WWTPs

Two main programmes of the Clean Serbia Project are:

1. Construction of sewage network and wastewater treatment plants
2. Repair, reconstruction, re-cultivation and construction of landfills with solid waste treatment

Jelena Tanasković, a secretaire at the Ministry of Ecology reminded during the presentation that said Ministry will not deal with project related to waters and land but that it will also work on projects pertaining to air, subsidize the purchase of electric cars and continue to subsidize in relation to energy efficiency in the following year. “Aside from everything else, we will continue to repair the landfills, the construction of 8 regional centres which will cover over 50 units of Local Government is planned. We will continue with the programme of removing wild dumps in cities and municipalities. There is a lot of green projects. Aside from 27 million RSD the Ministry of Construction has allocated for this project there is additional 9 billion credit lines”, says Jelena Tanasković.

What could be gathered, the goal of the first part of the “Clean Serbia” Project are Cities and Municipalities which have not been in the forefront either due to the inefficient activity of Municipalities or due to the lack of financial funds. The Project will allow them to completely solve the problem of construction of sewage network and wastewater treatment plants.

The programme puts three parts to the forefront:

1. Maintenance of drinking water systems in cities and municipalities which are jeopardized due to uncontrollable discharge of the sewers (this is especially true for the area of the Morava river basin).
2. Protection of rivers from excessive pollution (focus is on the rivers Drina, Morava river basin, Timok, Kolubara, Mlava, Sava and the Danube)
3. Preservation of the environment and subsequent protection of one of the most important condition for further existence of people on this territory.

“Within the scope of the bilateral cooperation with Germany and German Development Bank KfW, the Ministry of Construction, Infrastructure and Transport is implementing the programmes of construction of municipal infrastructure in cities and municipalities of the Republic of Serbia. The goal of infrastructure programmes is to provide a sustainable urban development through the improvement of water supply systems, canalizing and wastewater treatment, collection, treatment and disposal of municipal waste” stated Enes Buhić, a secretaire at the Ministry of Construction, during the presentation.

As a result of the reached agreements, financing for infrastructural projects of the following investment value has been secured through five separate programmes:

340 billion EUR for 21 cities in the Republic of Serbia for over 1.7 million people

One of the supporting partners of the project is Hungary with whom a Framework Agreement on economical and technical cooperation was signed in February 2018, ratified in the Parliament of the Republic of Serbia, and has entered into force on 8 Nov 2018.

“The goal of this Framework Agreement is the improvement of cooperation between the parties in the field of infrastructural development. The Project will include the construction of municipal infrastructure, drinking water supply infrastructure, cleaning and remediation of two lakes, several projects of road infrastructure as well as the construction of a ship lock on the river Tisa near Novi Bečej” stated a secretaire at the Ministry Emeše Urban Lalić.

The wastewater treatment plant and sewage network: Lebane, Beočin, Kanjiža,Kovačica, Debeljača, Čoka, Pećinci, Sivac-Kula, Brus, Šid , Sijarinska banja and Medvedja are the locations which shall be financed by the Hungarian support.

During the presentation, Dr Nebojša Veljković spoke about the priorities of the construction of city wastewater treatment plants while professor Dr Dragan Povrenović informed the audience about the best available technologies for the treatment of waste waters. The economical aspect was elaborated on by Siniša Mitrović from the Centre for circular economy of the Chamber of Commerce of the Republic of Serbia.

The Project of Design and execution of works on the construction of municipal (sewage) infrastructure in the Republic of Serbia was declared a Project of Distinct Importance for the Republic of Serbia.

On 5 Aug 2021, 16 Relevant Annexes were signed for the construction of municipal (sewage) infrastructure in the Republic of Serbia for 14 municipalities – cities (16 locations) for the following sites: Lazarevac, Veliki Crljeni, Obrenovac, Svrljig, Lajkovac, Vranje, Novi Bečej, Krupanj, Kučevo, Novi Sad phase I – centre, Kladovo, Mionica, Banja Vrujci, Kragujevac phase I – centre, Varvarin, Knić.

The deadline for the completion of works on every relevant design is 39 months.

That environmental protection is one of the priorities of the Government of the Republic of Serbia is unequivocally confirmed by the capital project “Clean Serbia” which was launched with the Chinese partners at the end of the summer. The Project, with the value of about three billion EUR, shall be implemented in around seventy municipalities throughout Serbia.

According to this national plan, Serbia needs to increase its energy efficiency and percentage of renewable resources in the production of electricity, as well as in the industry, heating and transport, and those ambitions shall be given voice in the future strategy of low-carbon development with an action plan and an integrated plan for energetics and climate, which shall be implemented soon.

Serbia only has one road map towards circular economy

According to that programme, Serbia shall in the following days invest almost six billion EUR into water management, out of which 4.3 EUR billion will be to prevent water pollution, and a billion and a half towards water supply. Within the scope of the first phase of the “Clean Serbia” project, 26 wastewater treatment plants and near 700 kilometers of brand new sewage network in 14 cities and municipalities shall be constructed.

“The plan of the Government of the Republic of Serbia is to construct municipal infrastructure in over 80 per cent of Local Governments within the next 5 years. We wish to invest into municipal infrastructure and wastewater treatment plants and therefore make our country significantly cleaner for the future generations”, says Tomislav Momirović, the Minister of Construction, Infrastructure and Transport, whose department is competent for the implementation of the “Clean Serbia” project.

Serbia is currently the only country in the region to prepare a road map for a circular economy, which gives guidelines for the development of a contemporary, resource and energy efficient circular economy.

Decades old problems to be solved in Novi Sad

The City of Novi Sad is included in the 14 Local Governments covered by the first phase of the “Clean Serbia” project, and it is the biggest individual municipal infrastructure investment project in the history of the city. The investments included in this project are of exceptional importance for all residents of Novi Sad and the environment they inhabit, because controlled drainage of waste waters and their treatment one of the most effective ways of preserving natural resources protecting the watercourses from pollution.

What is extremely important for the Serbian Athens is the fact that the construction of the Central City Purifier will be realized through this project and with that,  decades old problem of wastewater treatment and river course pollution will be solved. The river Danube, as one of the symbols of the city and a favourite location for rest and relaxation of its citizens will be receiving in the near future, thanks to this project, only treated and clean waste waters, which will provide a much healthier environment for the future generations.

Only from the “Clean Serbia” project, over 180 million EUR will be invested into solving the problem of waste waters and construction of fecal sewage. Over 100 million EUR will be invested into the Central Purifier by which decades old problem will be solved, and in total, 92 fecal sewage networks shall be constructed thanks to the “Clean Serbia”  programme.

Works have already begun in Kisač and Čenej

The implementation of the “Clean Serbia” project on the territory of the City of Novi Sad has begun with the construction of a sewage system in  Kisač (in the length of 24,536 meters) and Čenej (in the length of 17,498 meters), by which the problem of discharging and overflowing cesspools will soon be only a bad memory for the residents of those two suburbs.

In the settlement of  Čenej, apart from the fecal sewage, a separate wastewater treatment plant will be constructed, while the waste waters of Kisač will be drained to the Rumenka purifier.

The deadline for the execution of works on the territory of Novi Sad is 39 months, and the emphasis is on the resolution of wastewater problems in suburbs first, in order to improve the municipal standard in those areas.

Apart from Novi Sad, designing and execution of works on the construction of municipal (sewage) infrastructure shall begin as well at the following locations: Varvarin, Knić, Banja Vrujci, Krupanj, Lajkovac, Mionica, Kučevo, Svrljig, Kladovo, Lazarevac, Veliki Crljeni, Obrenovac, Vranje, Novi Bečej, Kragujevac.