Terrain Natural Resource Management - Water Quality in the Wet Tropics

Water Quality in the Wet Tropics

Barrier Reef's rescue ramped up

Australian Government annouces a further $7.5 million in funding for Reef catchments

The Great Barrier Reef will benefit from an additional $7.5 million in funding to boost efforts to protect the health of the Reef.

Minister for the Environment, Peter Garrett announced in Cairns recently that the funding would go towards monitoring water quality in rivers and wetlands and encouraging improvments in land management and land condition. Read more.

Funding priorities include activities and priority actions such as those identified in water quality improvement plans and other planning activities currently being carried out across the region.

Water Quality Improvement Plans

Waterways link land and sea in an interconnected system. Flowing creeks and rivers carry nutrients and sediments supporting rich aquatic life; wetlands filter the water before it flows into the Reef lagoon. Waterways are nurseries and migratory pathways for fish, crabs and all manner of wildlife.

We as humans are part of this system. In fact we play an integral role in it. What we do in one part of a catchment usually has implications downstream and sometimes throughout the entire catchment.

All members of the (human) community enjoy multiple benefits provided by the region's creeks, rivers, wetlands, and of course the Reef: drinking water, water for irrigation, stock and industry, natural places for recreation and ecotourism, fishing opportunities (and seafood) and places of cultural significance. In fact locals value the region's waterways for many different reasons.

To give our children and grandchildren a chance to enjoy these benefits in the future, we need to manage how we use "our" waterways now. That is why Water Quality Improvement Plans (WQIPs) are being developed for each of the region's major coastal catchments.

These plans identify the main problems facing local waterways and the key means for "cleaning up" and maintaining catchments. These actions will in turn help the Great Barrier Reef, which is being affected by excessive amounts of nutrients, pesticides and sediments carried from upstream.

The WQIPs are a vital part of the Australian and Queensland Government's Reef Water Quality Protection Plan (2003). This overarching plan aims to "halt and reverse the decline in water quality entering the Reef within 10 years."