Water quality monitoring in the Mersey

This is the Water Quality Monitoring in the Mersey Estuary report produced by the Environment Agency in 2001. This report focuses on the Water Quality Monitoring Programme held in the Mersey Estuary. Since the mid-1960s water samples have been collected at approximately monthly intervals along the length of the estuary between Warrington and New Brighton and in later years further off-shore. This data-set provides an invaluable resource to determine how the very large capital spending of recent years has resulted in the dramatic improvements in water quality that we are now able to record. Initially, the interest was focused on parameters such as dissolved oxygen, BOD, nutrients and suspended solids. Over the last decades, as analytical methods have improved, toxic metals and persistent organic compounds have been included in the routine monitoring programme at a limited number of sites. Moreover, with the introduction of the European Water Framework Directive monitoring programmes it was an opportune time to review the Mersey monitoring strategy. This revised monitoring programme required data from several other components (water, sediments, flora, fauna, fish and birds. This report also contains information about Routine monthly surveys, Special surveys, Chloralkali Directive, UKNMP, British Geological Survey, EDMAR and NERC Environmental Diagnostics Thematic Programme.

Socio-economic profile of the Philippine National Aquasilviculture Program (PNAP) beneficiaries in Jiabong, Samar, Philippines

A total of 37 beneficiaries under the Philippine National Aquasilviculture Program (PNAP) was interviewed using the structured survey questionnaire of Socioeconomic Monitoring Guidelines for Coastal Managers in Southeast Asia (SocMon SEA). Most of the members of the households are young and in-school. Household heads’ primary occupation is fishing, a shift from mussel farming- the town’s major industry in the past decades. Perceived threat by the beneficiaries is related to the environment specifically typhoon and the problems on waste disposal. It also identified law enforcement as weak leading to dwindling fish catch, mass mortality of mussel, red tide and other problems affecting their primary sources of income. However, they could not relate these phenomena to the most likely causes. The current occupation does not provide sufficient income for the family as they seek for alternative jobs. Garbage and poor implementation of laws are among the identified problems of the beneficiaries.