The scope of water quality management strategy

What is the scope of your water quality management strategy?

You need to agree on the scope of your water quality management strategy, given the constraints of your particular area (e.g. resources, time frames).

Key questions that you need to answer include:

  • What resources are available to you?
  • What time periods are you managing for and how can you 'phase' your efforts to achieve maximum protection of the issues of your waterways within your particular constraints?
  • Which waterways are you managing (and how do they relate to /link with other waterways in the system)?
  • Most strategies are based on catchments, but it you are only dealing with particular sub-catchment(s), you should broadly consider regional issues and establish necessary links to relevant matters.
  • How do you link to related waterway management activities?

What information is available for your waterway?

This page is designed to help you gather initial information on your waterways, including current values/uses, water quality and ecosystem health of the waterway.

Search for relevant information on the web via one of the following options:

Coastal information

This link will take you to a search tool to acquire regional information, maps and mapping tools, information about wetlands, coastal legislation and planning and policy information.

Water quality information

Search a list of potential stressors to your waterway.

Regional plans and strategies

These link provide lists of regional information resources including web-enabled mapping systems, management plans, regional strategies etc. for each state.

Coastal stakeholders

These links go to organisations that have an interest in the coastal zone.

Estuary information

Search the OzCoasts database to gather comprehensive information about Australia 's estuaries and coastal waterways.

Back to top of page

Additional resources


For help with compiling your waterway profile, refer to Compiling your waterway profile (Waterwatch Australia).

If you have already collected your own water quality data, you can now create a graph of the water quality data you have collected and compare it with the water quality guidelines.
Do you need to know how to collect water quality data? Find out more information about Remote Sensing using the Remote Sensing Toolkit ( Coastal CRC, University of Qld and CSIRO )

Back to top of page