(Bloomberg) -- European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen promised to mobilize up to €10 billion ($11 billion) in funding to help central European leaders grappling with the worst flooding in decades.
“I am here to reassure you that Europe stands by your side,” von der Leyen said standing alongside several of them in the western Polish city of Wroclaw.
The sum will come from the EU’s cohesion fund and won’t require co-financing from member states to allow more flexibility, said von der Leyen, as “extraordinary times demand extraordinary measures.”
Central European heads of government praised that move. “This is important, because we can then use it quickly to help people in this situation. There is no co-financing, which means it will be less complicated,” said Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer.
The commission president also said that the funds can be used as pre-financing for investment.
“We have to continue the development of flood infrastructure for the future,” said Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala.
Authorities in Poland and the neighboring Czech Republic have already warned that their economies will take a hit from the flooding, which has killed at least 20 people across the region. The catastrophe has laid bare the way shock weather events are becoming more commonplace, with record heat over the summer giving way to torrential rain.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk has strived to stay ahead of the crisis as his government braces for a hit on top of a record deficit expected in 2025. The government in Warsaw has pledged at least 2 billion zloty in immediate aid. Tusk later told Polsat News television that Poland could end up with €5 billion in EU assistance.
In the Czech Republic, where floodwaters were dropping even as thousands of households remained without electricity and transport lines were disrupted, Fiala’s government announced plans to increase fiscal deficits this year and next to address the damage. A blow to Prague’s ambitions to curb debt, the 2024 budget gap will widen some 12% from an original plan, by about 30 billion koruna, the Finance Ministry said.
Austria has raised its emergency response budget to €1 billion, and Nehammer said in a post on X that his government will be able to call on €500 million in EU cohesion funds.
In Wroclaw, residents were shoring up defenses along the Oder River, with many recalling the devastating flooding of 1997, when 65% of the city of 650,000 affected. Flooding crested overnight, with water exceeding levels predicted earlier, but the situation was stabilizing, authorities said.
--With assistance from Patrick Donahue and Agnieszka de Sousa.
(Updates with Tusk’s estimate for EU funds in eighth paragraph)
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