The total wastewater discharged into surface water bodies, made up1205.28 million m³ in 2001, including 28 million m³ of polluted water, 903.24 million m³of normatively treated water, 273.04 million m³ of normatively clean one (fig).

118.01 million m³ were removed to the filtration fields and cesspools, storage facilities.

The great bulk of waste water (about 70%) is accumulated in the municipal sector, then go industry and agriculture

As a rule, present sewerage systems and schemes of urban settlements provide combined treatment for municipal and industrial wastewater at the same treatment plants.

Tough the total capacity of treatment facilities is higher than the real volume of treated waste water, treatment quality does not always reach the required impact. That results from the fact that the treatment facilities of most enterprises take on wastewater, in which pollutant concentrations considerably exceed standards. Moreover there is evidence that some treatment plants either are overloaded or operate inefficiently.

As before Minsk, whose industrial-economic system forms more runoffs than those of the major cities combined and any region of the country, accounts for the most powerful local chemical load on the river systems. Most waste water enters into the Dnieper and its tributaries (the Berezina and the Svisloch), least waste water goes into the Western Bug River system.

In the table are included data on indices for waste water discharges since 1980.