All around you is parched sand, the odd discarded fishing net, polyps of dry reed – beyond that a fence, a clutter of beached boats, and finally a narrow, distant ribbon of sea. Hendrik Willem Mesdag’s Scheveningen Panorama, one of the oldest artistic monuments in the Hague, masterfully captures the dual relation between water and urban society as something at once set apart from and central to our lives. “We think that water will always flow easily from our taps, but it will become a problem, it will become a scarce commodity,” warns Robert van Asten, Deputy Mayor of The Hague.
For the Hague, emerging issues with water are also of a dual nature. On the one hand, its coastal location means that rising sea levels pose a threat. While the Dutch are famous for their history of warding off the sea, rising levels nonetheless mean greater quantities of salt in groundwater. This in turn reduces the capacity of the earth to sustain plant life or be used for drinking or agriculture.
On the other hand, the river from which the Hague gets its drinking water, piped in from a distance of 90 kilometres, is suffering from its own issues. “The River Meuse is a rainwater river,” van Asten explains, “and due to climate change the prediction is that it will start running dry in the summers by 2050, getting lower and lower as we approach that date.” Add to that the Hague’s growing population and the pollution that seeps into the water from agricultural processes on its banks and you have all the ingredients for a serious problem.
A wake-up call
It was during a trip to the UN Water Conference that van Asten fully realised the scale of the water crisis facing The Hague and other European cities. “That was for me really the wake-up moment,” he recalls, where he realised that water issues were central to the future of urban development, and that it was up to him to pursue them, both locally as deputy-mayor and internationally through the European Committee of the Regions.
By the time that we start thinking that it might be a problem, it will probably already be too late.
“From a political point of view, well, it’s not a game changer for people to vote on,” van Asten says, acknowledging that the solutions required to address water scarcity will need sustained commitment beyond the election cycle. Despite a general public perception that water is not an urgent issue in places like the Netherlands, he is committed to raising awareness and pushing for systemic changes.
For van Asten, it is essential for politicians to take the long view, rather than waiting for water to become an emergency. As he points out, “By the time that we start thinking that it might be a problem, it will probably already be too late.”
Water for cities and farms
Being located on the coast means that the Hague is last in line for river water, which passes cities, borders, and many kilometres of farmland before finally making it to the Hague’s filtration systems. Van Asten notes the danger of increasing levels of pollution from fertilisers and other agrochemicals that seep into the water on its way downstream: “If you have a government which is more concerned with ensuring you can have 1,000 cows per square meter of land, then of course the quality of our rivers will suffer.”
Yet he does not endorse the binary thinking of ‘urban versus rural.’ “The metropolitan area is more than urban parts, it is also the surrounding rural area,” he says, “You want to have a synergy between those two.” For example, encouraging the urban population to purchase the products of local farmers both strengthens the local economy and creates shorter and less carbon-intensive supply chains.
If they are paid right, I think every farmer wants to be good to their land, their water and their animals.
“We have a strong market for exporting pork,” van Asten notes, “But when farmers get a penny for each pig, they still can’t make a living out of it.” He believes that more stringent environmental regulations are necessary for farms, but that they must be paired with better economic incentives. “If they are paid right,” he says, “I think every farmer wants to be good to their land, their water and their animals.”
Conversely, he says, incentives shouldn’t be used to encourage reckless practices. Van Asten notes the example of certain strawberry farms near protected wetlands in southern Spain. “They’re taking the water from the wetlands,” he explains, “which is protected with help from the EU – and they’re using European subsidies to destroy them, even as the surrounding desert continues to grow.”
A sponge city
Van Asten also highlights the broader issue of climate adaptation. The increasing frequency and intensity of storms pose a growing threat to cities across Europe, and The Hague is no exception. “We saw large rainfall in Copenhagen in 2011, in Germany in 2019, and in recent years in Limburg,” he says. These heavy downpours, concentrated over short periods, can overwhelm urban drainage systems and cause devastating floods.
To be prepared for a future where such incidents are increasingly common, The Hague has begun working on more resilient infrastructure and urban planning. For example, “We have a park, and underneath the park we have a large basin to collect water in wet periods,” van Asten explains. This water can be stored and used during dry spells to irrigate the park above, ensuring a green space for residents while also preventing flooding.
“In the past, we created cities as concrete jungles with a lot of parking places and stone squares,” he says. “Now, your city has to be a sponge.” The deputy mayor is inspired by the examples of many other European and Asian cities where urban areas have been redesigned as green oases.
Now, your city has to be a sponge.
This has the advantage of mitigating flooding and drought, but also keeps cities cooler, especially during heatwaves when they need it the most. “Especially on a hot summer day, there are neighbourhoods in The Hague where there’s a difference of 6 -10 degrees compared to other neighbourhoods.” This jeopardises the comfort and health of residents, but water features, unsealed soil like parks and gardens, and urban vegetation can provide an effective cure.
A blue Europe
As issues with water faced across Europe cannot be viewed in isolation, the Hague’s deputy mayor sees international action as a core part of his duty to his local constituents. Even now, he is acting as Shadow Rapporteur on the European Committee of the Regions’ Opinion on water and the scrapped EU Blue Deal.
“Now is actually the time to let our voices be heard in Europe,” he urges. As rivers flow between countries and continents, and the sea surrounds us all, van Asten says, “we need European cooperation to make sure that we still have clean and affordable drinking water.”
Van Asten is convinced that cities’ proximity to their residents gives their leaders a pragmatism that can be missing from national politics. As such, he has signed a declaration advocating for more cities to be involved in European affairs, noting that “70 to 80% of the European population will be living in metropolitan areas in the coming years. To ensure our systems can work and we have enough drinking water for our cities, now is the time to let our voices be heard in Europe.”
With such a large proportion of the population residing in cities, he argues that urban centres should have a stronger influence in shaping water policy, especially as cities are at the forefront of both water consumption and climate adaptation.
Van Asten reflects on the challenges of navigating these discussions at the European level, pointing to the Blue Deal initiative as an example. “We were working on the report, and we discussed whether we should also mention that if you have water scarcity, you should prioritise who gets the water first,” he explains. In his view, residents must always come first, but the question of whether agriculture, industry, energy or nature should follow is deeply complex.
Countries have been hesitant to address these thorny issues. “Saying anything about the farmers’ rights to an amount of water… it couldn’t be in the report,” van Asten recalls. The reluctance of governments to confront the serious questions around water health frightens him, as “the next five years are crucial for this issue.”
We need European cooperation to make sure that we still have clean and affordable drinking water.
In the end, the European Commission side lined the Blue Deal altogether. “The European Green Deal got a lot of heat, so the blue deal was put off the table,” van Asten regretfully recalls.
Van Asten remains determined. “I will keep doing this work because otherwise our city in 2050 will have a major problem,” he says. His commitment to ensuring that The Hague, and cities like it, remain resilient in the face of water scarcity is unwavering. However, he knows that time is running out: “There will be a year and maybe not this year,” he warns, “but then definitely next year or the year following it, that major cities in Europe will experience more problems.”
He recalls a recent incident in France when there were discussions about potentially needing to close down a nuclear power plant due to fears there would be insufficient water available to cool it.
“In a perfect storm,” Van Asten declares, “all these things in all major cities will happen at once. And I think then the people will demand measures to ensure water safety – but that will be too late.”
