Metsi Consultants - DWA Home Page

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Report No 678-F-001 METSI CONSULTANTS: SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS FOR PHASE 1 DEVELOPMENT 12.4. MANAGEMENT OF THE MONITORING PROGRAMME The success of the monitoring programme would depend on the rigour of the data collection, and on the manner in which the data are stored and analysed. There is little point in spending time and money collecting data, if these are not collected, archived, analysed and interpreted correctly. The following recommendations are thus made: a monitoring programme manager be appointed, who would be responsible for the co-ordination of the monitoring team and management of the programme; dedicated specialists be appointed to take responsibility for specific aspects of the monitoring programme; each member of the monitoring team keep a record of monitoring methods; quality control of all data and data-collection methods be applied by the monitoring team, and should be the responsibility of the Monitoring Programme Manager; a database be developed and housed at LHDA to store the data generated by the monitoring programme. This database should be updated annually and should allow easy access to, and interrogation of, the data. The database should link with other international databases currently being developed, which relate to IFRs and river condition. An example of such a database is the RIVERS DATABASE currently being developed by Southern Waters for the National Rivers Health Programme in South Africa. the monitoring programme be audited annually (ideally by an independent group of specialists referred to here as the Monitoring Steering Committee) to verify: the data are being collected at the stipulated intervals; the samples are being correctly analyzed; any laboratories undertaking sample analysis are performing their tasks correctly; the data are being stored in an efficient manner, and interpreted correctly; the IFR is achieving the predicted river conditions, with the predicted social and economic costs. the Monitoring Steering Committee consist of three members, one from each of the disciplines of sociology, ecology and water-resource management; the monitoring programme be refined at intervals, if necessary. If the IFR is not meeting its objectives there should be the twin facilities of being able to revise either the IFR being released, or the desired river condition it is meant to achieve. IFR monitoring is a new field of science world-wide. For the foreseeable future IFR monitoring programmes would be required not only to be refined on an ongoing basis using data collected as part of them, but also to take cognisance of developments and trends in the field of environmental flow monitoring. 72
Report No 678-F-001 METSI CONSULTANTS: SUMMARY OF MAIN FINDINGS FOR PHASE 1 DEVELOPMENT SECTION 13. IFR ASSESSMENT IN SOUTHERN AFRICA The IFR assessment undertaken for the LHWP is, in many respects, the most detailed and advanced flow assessment yet undertaken in southern Africa, and indeed anywhere in Africa. Key features have been the comprehensive and integrated hydrological, biophysical and social approach, and the specific inclusion of subsistence users into the assessment. Overall, the lessons learnt during the LHWP study are of great interest and value to the rest of the world, and the expertise gained by both scientists and managers could and should be exported to the rest of Africa and further. However, as noted below, IFA is not unique to Lesotho and environmental flows are currently a subject of concern in eight southern African countries and in five other African nations. 13.1. METHODS FOR ENVIRONMENTAL FLOW ASSESSMENT The methods used in the LHWP to address the use of environmental flows for river management area comprise the most advanced within four categories used in southern Africa 1 . Reconnaissance-level assessments rely on historical hydrological records for setting flow targets; the methods involve the least investment of time and effort, but there is the lowest confidence in their predictions; they do not necessarily have any ecological relevance; their best use is in large-scale regional planning of water resources. Hydraulic methods require site measurements of the river, and are used in conjunction with hydrological analysis to assess flows that occur often and are deemed to provide ‘good habitat’; links to the river ecosystem are tentative or absent, and ‘good habitat’ is largely a value judgement. Habitat-simulation methodologies link site-specific physical and hydraulic data for a range of discharges to favoured habitat of selected species and provide a more structured assessment of discharges and the related ‘good habitat’. These approaches have been used predominantly by Northern Hemisphere countries where decades of research have provided sufficient data for high-resolution descriptions of the flow requirements of selected plant and animal species. The methods focus on single species, usually fish of important recreational or economic value, and largely ignore the other parts of the ecosystem (e.g., aquatic invertebrates, water birds, riparian trees, marginal vegetation, algae), which are also flow dependent and which will influence the fish populations in some way. They focused mainly on the lowflow regime of the rivers in question. Holistic approaches address all parts of the ecosystem and all parts of the flow regime, and include the Building Block Methodology (BBM) used in South Africa, the Holistic Approach developed in Australia, and now the DRIFT (Downstream Response to Imposed Flow Transformations) approach used in the LHWP-affected rivers and described earlier in this report. A further development is the Flow Restoration Method used in Australia to address river rehabilitation. Holistic approaches are increasingly being recognized globally as the most appropriate way to do IFA as they allow a comprehensive assessment of the likely ecological and subsistence implications of a range of possible flow manipulations, thus placing before the decision-maker new information to supplement traditional engineering and economic information upon which water-resource decisions have been made in the past. 1 Details and references are given in Paxton, B., C.B. Brown and J.M. King. 2002. A review of activities linked to environmental flows in Africa. Unpubl. ms. 73
Page 1:
Kingdom of Lesotho Lesotho Highland
Page 4 and 5:
METSI CONSULTANTS: SUMMARY OF MAIN
Page 6 and 7:
Page 8 and 9:
Flow Scenarios METSI CONSULTANTS: S
Page 10 and 11:
Page 12 and 13:
Mitigation of Flow-Related Impacts
Page 14 and 15:
Page 16 and 17:
Page 18 and 19:
Page 20 and 21:
Page 22 and 23:
Page 24 and 25:
Report No 678-F-001 METSI CONSULTAN
Page 26 and 27:
Page 28 and 29:
Page 30 and 31:
Page 32 and 33:
Page 34 and 35:
Page 36 and 37:
3.2.6 Detailed Sociological Study R
Page 38 and 39:
Page 40 and 41:
4.1.3 Design Limitation Report No 6
Page 42 and 43:
Negligible: 0% probability Minimal/
Page 44 and 45: Report No 678-F-001 METSI CONSULTAN
Page 58 and 59: 6.4. ECONOMIC IMPACTS Report No 678
Page 66 and 67: 8.2. BIOPHYSICAL CONSEQUENCES Repor
Page 76 and 77: 10.5. PUBLIC HEALTH IMPACTS Report
Page 88 and 89: 11.4.7 Animal Health Report No 678-
Page 90 and 91: 12.2.2 Social Reaches and Villages
Page 98 and 99: 13.2.9 Tanzania Report No 678-F-001
Page 102 and 103: Step 2: Optimisation of the preferr
Page 108 and 109: Chemistry (water quality) Botany Ma
Page 110 and 111: METSI CONSULTANTS: SUMMARY OF MAIN
Page 122: METSI CONSULTANTS: SUMMARY OF MAIN
show all

Metsi Consultants - DWA Home Page

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?