Water Authority secretive about HUF 4.7 billion droughtrelief budget

Climate change continues to effect Hungary in the form of now-regular droughts, which in the last few years, 2025 included, peaked in July. The government attempted to address this with a “drought protection action plan”. This project had a budget of HUF 4.7 billion, and we were curious how exactly was it spent. However, the National Water Authority has not given a proper response even after nearly three months.

“This is not a new problem in Hungary, where we have to contend with floods, inland flooding, and droughts. This year will be a drought year, and we have to cope with that,” said Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in early May this year when he announced the creation of the Drought Protection Operational Headquarters. Then, on May 28, Gergely Gulyás, head of the Prime Minister’s Office, announced at a government press conference that the government had declared a drought emergency and allocated 4.7 billion HUF (12,1 million EUR) to fill reservoirs and canals in anticipation of this year’s drought.

Two months later, on July 4, Imre Hubai, State Secretary for Agriculture at the Ministry of Agriculture, stated: “Before we pass judgment on the issue or give advice to others, we must learn to manage our own water resources responsibly.” Hubai made this statement near Jászkisér, where, accompanied by János Pócs (Fidesz), a member of the National Assembly, he observed water management officials filling the material extraction pits left over from the construction of the Hanyi-Tiszasűly flood control reservoir with water from the main regional canal.

Referring to the 4.7 billion forints allocated by the government for drought protection, the state secretary said that the Water Management Directorates would use the money to “carry out water replenishment at 260 intervention points and implement water retention measures and technical interventions.” A few days later, one such “intervention” took place: the Middle Danube Valley Water Management Authority cleared the banks of the Zagyva River near Bátonyterenye under the guise of “riverbed regulation” and “maintenance dredging” as part of the drought protection action plan.

Based on Imre Hubai’s statement about 260 intervention points, we submitted a public information request to the National Water Authority (OVF) in Early August, asking for a list of interventions carried out as part of the program.

Apart from several automated responses informing us which OVF employees were on vacation and for how long, nothing happened.

A month later, in early September, we sent a reminder message stating that the 15-day response legal deadline available to them under the Information Act had long expired and asking them to kindly send us the requested data.

Two days later, on September 5, they wrote a letter asking us to specify what data we were requesting (even though we made it clear in our original request). We immediately replied, asking them to “please send us data on water retention measures to be implemented immediately to combat drought,” but to no avail.

As nothing happened for days and weeks, so on September 26, nearly two months after submitting our original data request, we sent another reminder to the OVF, stating that the deadline, which had already been extended due to the clarification request, had long passed and asking them to release the requested data.

This was followed by another automated message about one of their employees being on vacation, and then silence.

We were just about to file a complaint against them with the National Authority for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (NAIH) when, unexpectedly, they sent us a substantive reply on October 21. It took them nearly three months after we submitted our data request to get this far, but they still did not disclose the data we requested. We had requested specific locations and the names and costs of the “interventions” carried out or planned there, but the OVF only provided general information.

They wrote that “As part of the drought protection action plan, the water sector carried out mechanical interventions at 22 locations nationwide to expand water replenishment. Hydraulic engineering interventions were necessary at 188 locations to expand water replenishment, and 58 backwaters were filled to their maximum storage capacity. In addition to the above, equipment purchases were necessary at 14 locations to expand water replenishment, and 58 tertiary (non-state-owned) channels were filled. Water replenishment took place at approximately 34 locations as part of the implementation of the “Water into the Landscape” program.

Since the OVF did not respond to our data request for nearly three months, we filed a complaint against it with NAIH. Hopefully, the authority’s investigation will reveal why they were unable or unwilling to answer the simple question of where exactly and on what they spent the 4.7 billion forints of public money received from the state treasury during the drought.