Three authors of a new paper from Freshwater Habitats Trust explain how a new approach to managing the whole freshwater environment – the Freshwater Network – could help us reverse the decline in freshwater biodiversity across England, Wales and beyond.
What is the Freshwater Network?
The Freshwater Network is:
1. A conceptual framework which recognises the interconnected and interdependent nature of freshwater ecosystems across habitat types.
2. A spatial analysis tool which identifies areas of high freshwater biodiversity value (Important Freshwater Landscapes and Important Freshwater Areas) and areas where freshwater conservation action can most effectively be targeted (Wetland Opportunity Areas).
Over the past two centuries, most of the UK’s rivers, ponds, lakes, streams and wetlands have either been degraded or lost entirely. Efforts to restore riverine ecosystems are stalling, and there is evidence that whole-landscape freshwater biodiversity continues to decline. It’s increasingly clear that we need to take a different approach to managing the water environment. The Freshwater Network is a first step towards a new approach; one which encompasses all habitat types and focuses on protecting the best remaining habitats, and then building out to expand areas of high freshwater biodiversity value across our landscapes.
Because the Freshwater Network spans the whole of the water environment, it refocuses conservation attention on historically neglected small waters and wetlands, which are collectively vital in supporting freshwater biodiversity. This has the added benefit of promoting creation and restoration of these habitats – actions which are disproportionately effective at increasing freshwater biodiversity across landscapes.
– Professor Jeremy Biggs, CEO of Freshwater Habitats Trust and visiting Professor at Oxford Brookes University.
What would this new approach mean for freshwater conservation?
The Freshwater Network promotes a different approach to the current focus of statutory management, which puts most emphasis on cleaning up polluted and degraded habitats. Identification of freshwater biodiversity hotspots facilitates protection of the best remaining sites, then building out from these strongholds to reconnect landscapes and create a network of high-quality waterbodies for freshwater plants and animals.
In our Ecological Solutions and Evidence paper, we identify 24 Important Freshwater Landscapes. These are the regions of England and Wales that include concentrations of high-quality habitats and rare and sensitive plants and animals, which collectively cover more than a third of England and Wales. Knowing which parts of the country are the most important for freshwater life means we can better target measures to safeguard those areas.
We’ve already integrated the Freshwater Network approach into our practical conservation work in Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, North Yorkshire, mid-Wales and the New Forest. In these regions – and others across the country – we’re using Important Freshwater Area analyses to help us protect the habitats that are richest in biodiversity. We’re then building out from these strongholds by creating and restoring new habitats in Wetland Opportunity Areas.
– Dr Naomi Ewald, Technical Director, Freshwater Habitats Trust.
What policy changes do you hope to achieve through the Freshwater Network approach?
The Freshwater Network recognises and reflects scientific evidence that freshwater ecosystems function in interconnected and interdependent networks across habitats of all kinds – with small waters playing a particularly important collective role. In England and Wales, the regulatory framework for water mostly developed before this evidence had been collected. To drive the restoration of our water environment, water policy now needs to catch up with the science. That means shifting away from a bias towards large waterbodies and towards recognition of the value of freshwater habitats of all kinds – running and standing, large and small, permanent and temporary. We hope that the Freshwater Network can help to propel this change.
Because small waters are relatively cheap, quick and easy to create, restore and manage, they provide a golden opportunity in our collective efforts to tackle biodiversity loss. But we need small waters to be better recognised in policy so that they can be properly protected and more easily created and restored.
– Dr Sam Tasker, Policy Officer, Freshwater Habitats Trust
Read the full article ‘Building the Freshwater Network: A new approach to the identification of freshwater biodiversity hotspots and restoration opportunities in England and Wales‘ in Ecological Solutions and Evidence.
