Abstract
This study designed and implemented a national estuarine monitoring programme for South African estuaries. The National Water Act (Act No. 36 of 1998) mandates the Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) to undertake monitoring for the protection of water resources. Monitoring also forms an integral component of estuarine management plans which are a requirement of the Integrated Coastal Management Act (Act No. 24 of 2008). The design of the programme was based on a review of international best practice, a critical evaluation of existing national monitoring programmes implemented by DWS and workshop input from a group of national experts. The National Estuary Monitoring Programme has three tiers. Tier 1 focuses on basic data, Tier 2 makes use of the methods used for determining estuarine freshwater inflow requirements, and Tier 3 is usually of a short temporal scale and dependent on the issue at hand, such as a sewage spill or fish kill. Tier 1 monitoring commenced on 21 priority estuaries between 2012 and 2014 in collaboration with government conservation authorities, conservation forums and local and district municipalities. Available financial and human resources guided the selection of the priority estuaries. Analysis of the implementation of the programme showed that collaboration between all relevant role-players was central to the successes achieved during the first 3 years of the programme and will continue to be critical for the success of the programme, although funding remains a challenge.
Highlights
The National Biodiversity Assessment (NBA) classified 291 estuaries in South Africa into 46 estuarine ecosystem types (Nel et al, 2011)
The three components were a literature review of international monitoring practice pertaining to the estuarine environment in Europe, Australia and United States of America, followed by a critical evaluation of existing national monitoring programmes implemented by Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) within the context of the National Water Act (Act No 36 of 1998), the Strategic Framework for National Water Resource Quality Monitoring (DWAF, 2004b), National Water Resource Strategy (DWAF, 2004c) and the 5 Year
The overall objective will result in an estuarine monitoring programme that will collect relevant, consistent and reproducible long-term data to facilitate information generation and dissemination for the future integrated national, regional and local management of South African estuaries (Fig. 4)
Summary
The National Biodiversity Assessment (NBA) classified 291 estuaries in South Africa into 46 estuarine ecosystem types (Nel et al, 2011). Estuaries constitute one of the most threatened habitats in South Africa (Turpie et al, 2002), with an estuarine functional zone that covers 171 046 ha (Van Niekerk and Turpie, 2012). This zone is seen as the entire area associated with an estuary that ensures its functionality, and includes open water area as well as floodplain and salt marsh areas. The South African coastal zone is an area of high population density, as a result of port and associated industrial, trade and residential development as well as tourism-related activities. Over the past four decades there has been substantial pressure on these productive ecosystems as a result of this anthropogenic activity
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