task of promoting the growth of the level of quality and technical skills, while the latter has to – mainly – promote awareness and spatial thinking.145 In this perspective, also the recent Communication by the EU Commission146 supports the transition of the sector to digitization, emphasizing the EU R&I programmes and the Knowledge, Research & Innovation as catalysts of change.147 IX. FOLLOWS: IN THE WATER SECTOR: THE CURRENT STATE OF DIGITIZATION Digital transformation concerns also the water sector. The legal literature in such field is not so developed.148 By contrast, important conferences and reports have been published, outlining the current state of digitization in the water sector, identifying its key challenges and potential benefits. Worth noting are the policy brief published by the European Commission in 2022149, the report developed for the Union for Mediterranean (UfM) Secretariat in 2024150, and, more recently, the European Water Resilience Strategy, adopted by the European Commission on 4 June 2025.151 The policy brief provides an overview of current gaps in the EU legislative framework that hinder the realization of the benefits of digitization in the water sector and offers concrete recommendations on how to overcome them. It benefitted from the developed and tested 38 digital solutions in 21 case studies. The policy brief underlines the importance of the connections 145 A. Scuderi, La digital trasformation, cit., p. 17. 146 EU Commission, COM(2025) 75, cit., point 4, p. 25. 147 See point 4, p. 24-26. 148 Within the scientific (but neither legal nor regulatory in a broad sense) works, see (besides the studies cited infra) P. Conejos Fuertes, F. Martínez Alzamora, M. Hervás Carot, J.C. Alonso Campos, Building and exploiting a Digital Twin for the management of drinking water distribution networks, in Urban Water J., 2020, 17, p. 704–713; I. Kougias, et al., Analysis of emerging technologies in the hydropower sector, in Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev., Vol. 113, 2019; A.N., Pedersen, et. al., Living and Prototyping Digital Twins for Urban Water Systems: Towards Multi-Purpose Value Creation Using Models and Sensors, in Water, Vol. 13(5), 2021; H.M. Ramos, et al., Smart Water Grids and Digital Twin for the Management of System Efficiency in Water Distribution Networks, in Water, Vol. 15(6), 2023. 149 U. Stein, et al., Digitalisation in the Water Sector. Recommendations for Policy Developments at EU Level, European Commission, Brussels, Belgium, 2022. 150 UfM, Digital Transformation for Water and Sustainable Development, Final Report, January 2024. 151 Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, European Water Resilience Strategy, COM(2025) 280 final, 4 June 2025. 457 WATER GOVERNANCE AND RIGHT TO FOOD
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