The Biological Assessment and Rehabilitation of the World's Rivers
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water Review The Biological Assessment and Rehabilitation of the World’s Rivers: An Overview Maria João Feio 1,* , Robert M. Hughes 2,3, Marcos Callisto 4 , Susan J. Nichols 5 , Oghenekaro N. Odume 6 , Bernardo R. Quintella 7,8 , Mathias Kuemmerlen 9 , Francisca C. Aguiar 10 , Salomé F.P. Almeida 11 , Perla Alonso-EguíaLis 12, Francis O. Arimoro 13 , Fiona J. Dyer 5 , Jon S. Harding 14 , Sukhwan Jang 15, Philip R. Kaufmann 3,16, Samhee Lee 17, Jianhua Li 18, Diego R. Macedo 19 , Ana Mendes 20 , Norman Mercado-Silva 21 , Wendy Monk 22 , Keigo Nakamura 23 , George G. Ndiritu 24 , Ralph Ogden 25, Michael Peat 26, Trefor B. Reynoldson 27, Blanca Rios-Touma 28 , Pedro Segurado 8 and Adam G. Yates 29 1 Department of Life Sciences, MARE-Marine and Environmental Sciences Centre, University of Coimbra, 3000-456 Coimbra, Portugal 2 Amnis Opes Institute, Corvallis, OR 97333, USA; [email protected] 3 Department of Fisheries & Wildlife, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA 4 Laboratory of Ecology of Benthos, Department of Genetic, Ecology and Evolution, Institute of Biological Sciences, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Avenida Antônio Carlos 6627, CEP 31270-901 Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil; [email protected] 5 Centre for Applied Water Science, Institute for Applied Ecology, University of Canberra, 2601 Canberra, Australia; [email protected] (S.J.N.); fi[email protected] (F.J.D.) 6 Unilever Centre for Environmental Water Quality, Institute for Water Research, Rhodes University, P.O. Box 94, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa; [email protected] 7 MARE—Marine and Environmental Sciences Centre, University of Évora, 7000-812 Évora, Portugal; [email protected] 8 Department of Animal Biology, Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon, Campo Grande, Citation: Feio, M.J.; Hughes, R.M.; 1749-016 Lisboa, Portugal; [email protected] 9 Department of Zoology, School of Natural Sciences, Trinity Centre for the Environment, Trinity College Callisto, M.; Nichols, S.J.; Odume, Dublin, The University of Dublin, College Green, Dublin 2, Ireland; [email protected] O.N.; Quintella, B.R.; Kuemmerlen, 10 Centro de Estudos Florestais, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Universidade de Lisboa, Tapada da Ajuda, M.; Aguiar, F.C.; Almeida, S.F.P.; 1349-017 Lisboa, Portugal; [email protected] Alonso-EguíaLis, P.; et al. The 11 Department of Biology and GeoBioTec—GeoBioSciences, GeoTechnologies and GeoEngineering Research Biological Assessment and Centre, University of Aveiro, Campus de Santiago, 3810-193 Aveiro, Portugal; [email protected] Rehabilitation of the World’s Rivers: 12 Mexican Institute of Water Technology, Bioindicators Laboratory, Jiutepec Morelos 62550, Mexico; An Overview. Water 2021, 13, 371. [email protected] 13 https://doi.org/10.3390/w13030371 Department of Animal and Environmental Biology (Applied Hydrobiology Unit), Federal University of Technology, P.M.B. 65 Minna, Nigeria; [email protected] 14 School of Biologcal Sciences, University of Canterbury, 8140 Christchurch, New Zealand; Academic Editor: Jan H. Janse [email protected] Received: 9 December 2020 15 Department of Civil Engineering, Daejin University, Hoguk-ro, Pocheon-si 1007, Gyeonggi-do, Korea; Accepted: 25 January 2021 [email protected] Published: 31 January 2021 16 Pacific Ecological Systems Division, Center for Public Health and Environmental Assessment, Office of Research and Development, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Corvallis, OR 97333, USA; Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral [email protected] 17 with regard to jurisdictional claims in Korea Institute of Civil Engineering and Building Technology (KICT), 283 Goyangdaero, Ilsanseo-gu, published maps and institutional affil- Goyang-si 10223, Gyeonggi-do, Korea; [email protected] 18 Key Laboratory of Yangtze River Water Environment, Ministry of Education of China, Tongji University, iations. Shanghai 200092, China; [email protected] 19 Department of Geography, Geomorphology and Water Resources Laboratory, Institute of Geosciences, Federal University of Minas Gerais, Avenida Antônio Carlos 6627, CEP 31270-901 Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil; [email protected] 20 Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. MED—Instituto Mediterrâneo para a Agricultura, Ambiente e Desenvolvimento, LabOr—Laboratório de Ornitologia, Universidade de Évora, Polo da Mitra, 7002-774 Évora, Portugal; [email protected] Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. 21 Centro de Investigación en Biodiversidad y Conservacíon, Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos, This article is an open access article Cuernavaca, 62209 Morelos, Mexico; [email protected] distributed under the terms and 22 Environment and Climate Change Canada and, Canadian Rivers Institute, Faculty of Forestry and conditions of the Creative Commons Environmental Management, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, NB E3B 5A3, Canada; Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// [email protected] creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 23 Water Environment Research Group, Public Works Research Institute, 1-6 Minamihara, 4.0/). Tsukuba 305-8516, Japan; [email protected] Water 2021, 13, 371. https://doi.org/10.3390/w13030371 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/water Water 2021, 13, 371 2 of 45 24 School of Natural Resources and Environmental Studies, Karatina University, P.O. Box 1957, 10101 Karatina, Kenya; [email protected] 25 Environment, Planning and Sustainable Development Directorate, 2601 Canberra, Australia; [email protected] 26 Wetlands, Policy and Northern Water Use Branch, Commonwealth Environmental Water Office, 2601 Canberra, Australia; [email protected] 27 Acadia University, Canada Creek, Wolfville, NS B0P 1V0, Canada; [email protected] 28 Grupo de Investigación en Biodiversidad, Medio Ambiente y Salud (BIOMAS), Facultad de Ingenierías y Ciencias Aplicadas, Ingeniería Ambiental, Universidad de Las Américas, Vía Nayón S/N, 170503 Quito, Ecuador; [email protected] 29 Department of Geography, Western University and Canadian Rivers Institute, London, ON N6A 5C2, Canada; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected] Abstract: The biological assessment of rivers i.e., their assessment through use of aquatic assemblages, integrates the effects of multiple-stressors on these systems over time and is essential to evaluate ecosystem condition and establish recovery measures. It has been undertaken in many countries since the 1990s, but not globally. And where national or multi-national monitoring networks have gathered large amounts of data, the poor water body classifications have not necessarily resulted in the rehabilitation of rivers. Thus, here we aimed to identify major gaps in the biological assessment and rehabilitation of rivers worldwide by focusing on the best examples in Asia, Europe, Oceania, and North, Central, and South America. Our study showed that it is not possible so far to draw a world map of the ecological quality of rivers. Biological assessment of rivers and streams is only implemented officially nation-wide and regularly in the European Union, Japan, Republic of Korea, South Africa, and the USA. In Australia, Canada, China, New Zealand, and Singapore it has been implemented officially at the state/province level (in some cases using common protocols) or in major catchments or even only once at the national level to define reference conditions (Australia). In other cases, biological monitoring is driven by a specific problem, impact assessments, water licenses, or the need to rehabilitate a river or a river section (as in Brazil, South Korea, China, Canada, Japan, Australia). In some countries monitoring programs have only been explored by research teams mostly at the catchment or local level (e.g., Brazil, Mexico, Chile, China, India, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam) or implemented by citizen science groups (e.g., Southern Africa, Gambia, East Africa, Australia, Brazil, Canada). The existing large-extent assessments show a striking loss of biodiversity in the last 2–3 decades in Japanese and New Zealand rivers (e.g., 42% and 70% of fish species threatened or endangered, respectively). A poor condition (below Good condition) exists in 25% of South Korean rivers, half of the European water bodies, and 44% of USA rivers, while in Australia 30% of the reaches sampled were significantly impaired in 2006. Regarding river rehabilitation, the greatest implementation has occurred in North America, Australia, Northern Europe, Japan, Singapore, and the Republic of Korea. Most rehabilitation measures have been related to improving water quality and river connectivity for fish or the improvement of riparian vegetation. The limited extent of most rehabilitation measures (i.e., not considering the entire catchment) often constrains the improvement of biological condition. Yet, many rehabilitation projects also lack pre-and/or post-monitoring of ecological condition, which prevents assessing the success and shortcomings of the recovery measures. Economic constraints are the most cited limitation for implementing monitoring programs and rehabilitation actions, followed by technical limitations, limited knowledge of the fauna and flora and their life-history traits (especially in Africa, South America and Mexico), and poor awareness by decision-makers. On the other hand, citizen involvement is recognized as key to the success and sustainability of rehabilitation projects. Thus, establishing rehabilitation needs, defining clear goals, tracking progress towards achieving them, and involving local