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CHAPTER 8. A NEW APPROACH TO EUTROPHICATION CONTROL: IMPROVING MANAGEMENT CAPACITY

When considering the major challenges for development, the provision of access to water to meet basic needs is a fundamental problem. By 2025, two-thirds of the world's population will live in water stressed areas. Poor water and sanitation contribute a great deal to infant mortality and low life expectancy. By 2025, there will be 33 megacities with population of 8 million people and 500 cities with population of 1 million people. In developing countries 350 million people have no access to basic sanitation (Watson et al., 1998). To all these figures, it must be added that the world's population is growing at a fast rate of 100 million annually (Figure 8.1.). Individual wastes will generate 4 g of phosphorus, 15 g of nitrogen, and 100 g of carbon as biological oxygen demand (BOD) per day. This gives an idea of the wastes generated daily by the human population. Therefore eutrophication is a very acute environmental problem and will continue to be since for humans there is no zero discharge policy and organic wastes from human origin will be permanently added to lakes, rivers, reservoirs, and small ponds.

Figure 8.1. Growth of world's population.

Several approaches have been developed to solve the eutrophication problem and there are many examples of successful attempts to control it. The best known case is the solution of eutrophication for the Great Lakes basin, in North America. In this specific case, the strategy of adopting the basin-wide ecosystem approach to water quality management proved to be right. However in many regions of the world, specially in many developing countries, in Brazil, China, India, in South East Asia, and Eastern Europe, eutrophication of water bodies has reached dangerous levels, with several consequences as toxic algal blooms, impairing of fisheries, massive fish kills, unsuitability of water for human consumption, and increased potential for human deaths from contamination from eutrophic water with toxic algal blooms.

This publication is a new attempt to look at the eutrophication problem considering the overall picture and presenting the opportunities to integrate, emphasizing the multidisciplinary approach to the problem and incorporating the complexity of the biogeophysical, social, and economic problems. The publication is aimed to provide useful and synthetic information to all those involved in the management and decision-making regarding eutrophication and water related issues. It analyses the environmental and technical aspects, providing management guidelines from a technical point of view; it provides an overview of the economic impacts of eutrophication and cultural and social aspects. It emphasizes the public awareness and environmental education as a fundamental tool in eutrophication control. In addition, it provides a synthesis of the institutional and regulatory framework necessary to organize the society including the participation of the community. Therefore the publication presents eutrophication control as a multidisciplinary problem seeking new ideas and solutions, based on several experiences described in case studies which will help in shaping the overall picture and also show that there is not a general recipe to solve and control eutrophication: each lake, each reservoir or river, has its own peculiarities and should be treated as a unique situation. This publication not only describes the technical and scientific mechanisms to solve the eutrophication problem, but also emphasizes the cultural, economic, and social aspects as a fundamental process in its management. For effective control of eutrophication, a coordinated effort will have to be designed with the community's participation and a strong component on socio-economic values, as well as a process of cultural change.

Lakes, reservoirs, rivers, and wetlands belong to ecosystems that are their watersheds. The watersheds support a diversity of terrestrial and aquatic plants and animals in balance with the non living components. Thus, the watershed approach to eutrophication provides an ecological integrity based on this natural ecosystem unit, relatively easy to identify and to manage from several points of view. The watershed is a physical unit with a boundary, is a hydrological integrated ecosystem, provides an opportunity for partnerships, and gives the possibility of integrating scientific data bases with management actions. It is also a way to decentralize actions, empowering citizens to learn more about their watersheds. The watershed approach has been adopted as a research and monitoring unit, as a data base source, as a system for integrating biological principles, and, more recently, as an administrative and water management unit. This approach is becoming very effective as a research mechanism, as an administrative and institutional framework for management of water resources and, particularly, for the integration of land-water processes.

Several institutional steps can be taken at international, regional, national, and local levels in order to regulate the water uses and improve water management. Water resources administration has, as a new challenge and perspective, to promote a sustainable and rational utilization, protection and conservation of freshwater based on a dynamic, multisectoral and iterative approach. It is difficult to incorporate at national and local levels the international resolutions and guidances. This also takes time and effort, but in some countries, such as Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico, there has been intensive work in this direction, both at the regulatory level (i.e., new laws and regulations at national, provincial, and municipal levels) and at the community level.

Public participation is an important tool to develop pollution and eutrophication control programmes. The public participation will be enhanced throughout the organization of the watershed committees that will provide a forum for discussion and an opportunity for integration of a regulatory framework, technical actions, and the community perception and awareness of the problem. Public awareness is also fundamental for the development of the decision-making process and this can be achieved by using all forms of education, mass communication programmes, acceptance by the general public of a system of value (ethics), and increasing the sensitivity to environmental problems. A selection of solutions by experts, from a technical point of view with public approval could be one of the main achievements of eutrophication control at the watershed level.

It is necessary to avoid the conflicts of interest in the social groups and to integrate all the positive actions through the development of partnerships between the public sector, private sector, and the general public. The establishment of institutional and legal actions will enable the participation of social groups and non-governmental organizations in the whole process of environmental protection and management.

The economic aspects of the eutrophication problem have to be considered in this integrated picture. Many economic activities are associated with eutrophication control and prevention. The establishment of small companies for waste disposal and waste treatment are a possible opportunity that should be considered in developing partnership with public/private sectors. In the next century, the "water business" will encompass several possibilities of economic development and advancement. Small campanies with high technological qualities can be stimulated in relation to eutrophication control. For example, the use of ecotechnology, such as the build up of wetlands for waste treatment, or the development of innovative techologies for the recovery of small urban rivers, is already in practice in countries such as Japan, Argentina, Chile, Brasil, Mexico, and Spain. On the other hand, the costs of recovery of lakes and reservoirs are mounting and in many countries these costs are competing with the investment in education, science and techonology. For example, the cost of recovery of the Great Lakes was US$ 20 billion in 20 years. The cost of recovery of Tietê river in São Paulo State, is US$ 4 billion.

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Table of Contents

• Brochure
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• International Year of Forests
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• World Environment Day
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