A collaborative process of developing mathematical models for water quality management

Transferring a collaborative and sustainable process of developing mathematical models for decision support in the context of water quality management
Rural communities in the UK face considerable challenges in managing the country’s natural resources. Long-term sustainability of the food system is a central concern of the UK Government’s food strategy1, whereas the EU Water Framework Directive (WFD; 2000/60/EC) demands ‘good’ ecological status of most of the country’s water bodies by 2015. These national policy priorities and environmental legislation constraints are augmented by regional concerns, including the recreational value of the rural landscape, the quality of life and the health of rural communities, the viability of rural businesses and rural employment, especially in food production and tourism, and biodiversity2. Along with the responsibilities and mandates of the private and public sectors, the voluntary sector in particular is seen as important in negotiating and meeting conflicting needs3. The multitude of pressures and the complexity of the environment require scientific tools to support the management of natural resources. Mathematical models are essential for achieving this by making complexity comprehensible and manageable. However, there is growing evidence that models developed from a research perspective alone are often not used in practice4, not least because of
1 Defra (2010). Food 2030. http://www.defra.gov.uk/foodfarm/food/pdf/food2030strategy.pdf (24.05.2010); subject to policies and priorities of the new government
2 RELU (2005). The Unfolding Research Agenda. Rural Economy and Land Use Programme Briefing Series No. 3. http://www.relu.ac.uk/news/briefings/RELU%20Brief3%2024pp.pdf (24.05.2010)
3 Smith, L. E. D., H. Cook, A. Inman, D. Benson and A. Jordan (2010). Sinking or swimming? Surveying community based catchment groups in England and Wales. Water and Environment 2010, CIWEM’s Annual Conference, April 28th-29th, London, UK
4 Nilsson, M., A. Jordan, J. Turnpenny, J. Hertin, B. Nykvist and D. Russel (2008). The use and non-use of policy appraisal tools in public policy making: an analysis of three European countries and the European Union. Policy Sciences 41(4): 335-355
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incoherence between end-user expectations and model deliverables. Current UK Research Councils-funded research by the applicants shows that this situation can be reversed if a novel collaborative process of model development is adopted where the product is tailored to the end-user needs and those stakeholders key in making decisions and delivering the necessary actions are involved5. This process ensures credibility and scientific rigour of models, allows improvement of models by incorporating stakeholder knowledge, and builds trust in models from those deciding or affected by the decisions. Considerable KE opportunities exist for transferring this collaborative process of model development, strengthening capacity in the public and voluntary sectors to take it up, and building long-term relationships between research institutions and these sectors to ensure sustainability of the process.

For this fellowship, it is important to understand economic impact as being a contribution to society as well as to the economy, as per the UK Research Councils’ definition in the KE Fellowship guidance document. The fellow’s impact on economy will be in the context of fostering and providing scientific and technical support to developing cost-effective solutions for water quality protection, and wider natural resources management. Within the political economy of both private and public sectors the approaches to be further developed and disseminated can influence and justify real resource allocation decisions in favour of investment in environmental improvement. These impacts are expected to sustain the economic viability of farming as well as yielding associated economic benefits for the tourism and water supply industries, including water consumers. The fellow’s impact on society will be in the context of increasing the effectiveness of public services and policy, strengthening capacity in the voluntary sector and enhancing the societal responsibility of citizens, protecting ecosystem health, maintaining the recreational value of the landscape and the associated quality of life and community health, protecting raw water quality, and preserving biodiversity. This, in turn, will exert further positive feedback on developing cost-effective solutions for environmental management.
In terms of contributions to policy and practice, achieving improved catchment management and water quality protection is central to the RELU, and hence UK Research Councils, aim of advancing holistic understanding of the social, economic, environmental and technical challenges facing rural areas and the relationships between these. In terms of policy relevance and impact, the proposed work is solidly framed by two contemporary demands: first, the integration of the EU WFD into UK law, institutions and agency practice; and second, the 'decoupling' of subsidies from particular crops, the Single Farm Payment and increasing support to farmers via the Environmental Stewardship Scheme under the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The work of the fellow will be timely in preparation of the CAP reform in 2013, and results will be fed directly into policy and practice through the planned visit to Defra in December 2011 and the national workshop with Defra, Environment Agency and Natural England invitees in November 2012.
The modelling process and the resulting tools described above are a core part of an analytic-deliberative and adaptive approach to catchment management (as researched and tested in RELU research grant RES-229-25-0009-A). International experience and the pilot results for the Thurne and Tamar catchments demonstrate that such an approach may be able to sustain a ‘living-working landscape’ and protect water quality more cost effectively that either top-down regulation or large scale land acquisition. It is difficult to estimate the monetary value of water quality protection, but previous research gives some indication of the economic impact of the fellowship. For example, the annual benefits for East Anglia of a policy that would reduce phosphorus exports and thus prevent eutrophication was found to be more than €250M based on a willingness-to-pay study12. The annual cost of treating nitrate from
12 Bateman, I., Day, B., Dupont, D., Georgiou, S., Gonca Noceda Matias, N., Morimoto, S., Subramanian, L. (2006). Does phosphate treatment for prevention of eutrophication pass the Benefit-Cost-Test? CSERGE Working Paper EDM 06-13. Norwich: University of East Anglia
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agricultural sources to meet EU drinking water standards may be at least £13M13. As another example, conventional and organic farming may differ in their external costs associated with greenhouse gases, nitrate leaching and pesticide residues by 15-44 €/ha14.
The UK water companies have realised that failure to protect raw water quality risks loss of potable supplies in extreme events and increases water treatment costs, which in turn drive up carbon emissions and charges to customers. South West Water estimated that a £7.5M investment (an addition of 15p to each consumer’s annual bill) into on-farm practices in the Tamar catchment could defer £40M of water treatment upgrade costs and capture double the company’s carbon emissions, as well as supporting biodiversity under climate change15. Management practices, however, differ in their cost effectiveness. A German case study on groundwater nitrogen (N) load reduction, for example, estimated that integrating fertiliser and manure application (€0.92 per kg of avoided N load) was 10 times more cost effective than afforestation (€9.05 per kg of avoided N load)16. The modelling process and tools that are the subject of this fellowship provide means to facilitate the assessment of the cost effectiveness of such measures, allocate loading reductions across sources, and plan how best to work with farmers and rural communities to achieve these. Although some management options can improve both farm profitability and water quality, it will usually be necessary to design farmer incentive and/or regulatory schemes since the ‘double dividend’ is unlikely to be linear across scales. The scale and severity of land management changes necessary to achieve water quality targets can be assessed using the modelling approach. This can subsequently be linked to assessment of how resilient farm businesses are to compliance with pollutant loading requirements.
Investment in improved stewardship of natural resources, and specifically protection of water quality, by citizens, the private and the public sector must compete with many other demands on time and financial resources. The modelling process and tools developed by the prospective fellow provide an essential means to make complexity comprehensible and communicate with scientific validity the potential environmental (and consequent economic and social) benefits of investment. The voluntary sector believe such tools can provide the means to win the financial resources necessary for their work from both private and public sectors, but strategic and policy decisions within the public sector can similarly be influenced and justified.
Stakeholder acceptance, trust and ownership with regard to models and subsequent decisions have the potential to greatly reduce the administrative and enforcement costs of environmental regulation. Fostering this is another key element of the proposed work. In particular, strengthening the voluntary sector with capacity building, training and a sustainable partnership with research institutions is expected to be vital for delivering cost effective action to protect water quality in the future. The proposed open-source development of models will enable this as much as possible. The model end-users will retain stewardship of the tools and will have the necessary skills to keep using these as well as the necessary mix of skills and links to research institutions to modify the tools further at minimal cost. The long-term vision of this approach is that research institutions move towards ‘selling’ expertise rather than tools, while the tools are shared by the research and end-user community, thereby avoiding dublicated effort and allowing for a more problem-oriented investment of resources. The participatory modelling approach is further expected to yield societal benefits in terms of the social learning of all involved. On one hand, participation in model development and decision making will enhance the awareness and societal responsibility of citizens. On the other hand, incorporating stakeholder knowledge will improve the database of models and increase the efficiency of scientific decision-support.
The timescales over which the work of this fellowship can be expected to show direct,
13 Pretty,13 Pretty, J., Brett, C., Gee, C., Hine, R., Mason, C.F., Morison, J.I.L., Raven, H., Rayment, M., van der Bijl G. (2000) An assessment of the total external costs of UK agriculture, Agricultural Systems 65: 113-136; Pretty, J.N., Mason, C.F., Nedwell, D., Hine, R.E. (2002) A Preliminary Assessment of the Environmental Damage Costs of the Eutrophication of Fresh Waters in England and Wales, Report to the Environment Agency, CES Occasional Paper 02-2, University of Essex: Colchester; Pretty, J.N., Mason, C.F., Newdwell, D.B., Hine, R.E., Leaf, S., Dils, R. (2003) Environmental costs of freshwater eutrophication in England and Wales, Environmental Science & Technology 37: 201-208.
14 O’Riordan, T., Cobb, D. (2001). Assessing the consequences of converting to organic agriculture. Journal of Agricultural Economics 52 (1): 22-35
15 Ross, M. (2008). Roadford catchment management and collaboration with land users. Presentation to Roadford farmers, October 28th: Countryman Inn, Langdon Cross, UK
16 WaterCost Handbook (2008). http://www.watercost.org/download/research/watercost_booklet.pdf

absolute effects are large. The fellow will provide a framework and tools upon which decisions are still to be made, which in turn may take years to yield effects in terms of measurable changes in water quality and ecosystem health due to the timescales of the hydrological and biogeochemical processes involved. Drawing up a timetable for measuring direct, absolute impact in the lifetime of the fellowship is therefore challenging. However, it is possible to assess indirect, relative impact in terms of the acceptance and potential uptake of the proposed modelling process by end-users and stakeholders, which will give some indication of the fellowship’s success in the chain of events leading to actual impact. To achieve this, the following plan of measuring impact is proposed:
Impact
Method & timing
Acceptance and potential uptake of modelling process by Defra
Questionnaire after visit to Defra in month 12, to be re-assessed by online questionnaire in month 24
Acceptance and potential uptake of modelling process by the Environment Agency, Natural England and Rivers Trusts
Questionnaire after national workshop in month 23, to be re-assessed by project partners (ART, WRT & BA) one year later
Acceptance of modelling process by stakeholders, level of trust and ownership, and level of empowerment and social learning gained through the process
Two series of three questionnaires following workshops (months 4, 7, 11 & 15, 18, 22), to be followed by one-to-one interviews if appropriate; this process will be designed in months 1-2
Potential economic impact of decisions made based on models
Link with economic valuation analyses that project partners (WRT & BA) are planning.