Resources

In 1994, six local councils in partnership with the Queensland Government came together with the common vision to develop an integrated strategy using the best possible scientific knowledge in order to achieve a sustainable commitment to improving water quality and ecosystem health. From this partnership, the Moreton Bay Study was implemented as the first integrated approach to the issues of Moreton Bay and its catchment. The Study was conducted over a large geographic scale, necessary for an effective linking of processes and development of consistent regional management strategies. The study applied a staged approach; each stage with a different scope and objective. Stage 2 focused on river estuaries and Moreton Bay, developing the Water Quality Strategy and the Ecosystem Health Monitoring Program (EHMP) for the region. The EHMP was primarily implemented to independently evaluate how effective various environmental protection strategies were in restoring and protecting ecosystem health of Moreton Bay and its river estuaries. The program monitored three key aspects of ecosystem health identified by the study:

Key environmental processes must operate to maintain stable ecosystems Human impacted zones remain stable Critical aquatic habitats such as seagrass beds do not deteriorate.

Through consultation with the region’s scientific community, the study developed a conceptual diagram to highlight the issues affecting SEQ waterways. The rivers flowing into Moreton Bay are heavily loaded with nutrients and sediments, and have degraded some of the inshore ecosystems of the bay. As a result, many of the environmental protection strategies focus on improving diffuse and point source loads of nutrients and sediments entering our waterways.