A Preliminary Coastal Wetland Assessment Procedure: Designing and Testing an Environmental Sustainability Index for Mediterranean Lagoons

Coastal wetlands are important and fragile transitional environments for their ecological, hydrological, and conservation value. Yet, in the last 50 yr, they have been subject to a high level of anthropogenic disturbance, ranging from habitat disruption to pollution. Even important economic activities that directly or indirectly depend upon the ecological integrity of these unique environments, such as tourism, extensive fish farming, and clam rearing, may exert remarkable pressures on coastal lagoons. As a consequence, it is important to derive a methodology that allows for an integrated assessment of the ecological integrity of wetlands areas and the sustainability of the commercial activities that depend on it. In this work, we have defined a rapid, user friendly, and cost-effective tool to assess wetland condition based on an aggregated index of sustainability (ESI), which combines three scores targeted to quantifying habitat availability, functionality performance, and anthropogenic pressures, respectively. Three data forms have been compiled for 17 sites included in the LaguNet network, thus showing that (meta)data can be collected from a great deal of information coming from research centres, environmental agencies, grey literature, management bodies, and, in some cases, field surveys. A Monte Carlo sensitivity analysis has been performed to assess the sensitivity of the results to uncertainty or errors in the allocation of weights to the three components of the index. A randomization test applied to the 10 000 Monte Carlo replicates has allowed us to assess the robustness of the final ranking. The methodology presented here can be regarded as a cost-effective way to summarize a great deal of information and to provide a preliminary screening evaluation to help decision-makers in wetland assessment and management.

CARLETTI Alessandro; 

2006-12-13

Taylor & Francis

JRC35423

https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC35423,