Landkreis Emsland is a district in Lower Saxony, northwestern Germany. The project area covers approximately 160 river kilometers of the Ems and an area of 16,500 hectares of Emsland’s floodplain.
Disconnecting floodplains
The construction of transverse structures, bank reinforcements, and the adaptation to a federal waterway’s requirements have led to the extensive decoupling of the Ems from its floodplain areas. The once typical habitats of the project area can now only be found in rare cases. This is partly due to the lack of connection to oxbow lakes and tributaries. The use of large parts of the floodplains for agricultural purposes further deteriorates the situation.
EmsLand’s mission
One of the “EmsLand” project’s main objectives is to improve the dynamics in the Ems floodplains. The other is to develop more typical floodplain habitats such as near-natural water bodies, riparian forests, wet meadows and tall herb meadows. These contribute to a biotope network along the Ems, which is especially beneficial for animals and plants that depend on flowing waters or wet habitats. This is why it is important to create new ponds, increase the structural diversity of the tributaries, and restore the ecological continuity between the river, its floodplain and secondary floodplains. This is achieved by excavating or relocating dykes, which results in further development of wet, tall, herb meadows and riparian forests.
Stakeholder involvement
The measures are developed and planned by a project group with key local and regional stakeholders. Coordination and planning processes are closely interwoven and result in the creation of realistic measures, which can immediately be taken up in planning. This involvement of all stakeholders in the planning and implementation is the reason for the broad acceptance of the project among the population.
The measures, implemented in collaboration with local stakeholders, sustainably increase biodiversity and climate resilience in the Ems floodplain. They create steppingstone biotopes through to a biotope network and increase the sponge function of the floodplain, which can store more CO2.
Necessity of Nature-based Solutions
The “EmsLand” project makes significant use of Nature-based Solutions (NbS) to achieve its goals and is therefore closely linked to the objectives of ResiRiver. The exchange of experience between both projects can significantly increase the success of future climate and biodiversity protection measures.
The “EmsLand” project is financed by the Bundesamt für Naturschutz (BfN) with funds from the Bundesumweltministerium (BMUV), the state of Lower Saxony and the district of Emsland.