The journey from planning to delivery of catchment rehabilitation projects is a long road. Investment must be justified to a large range of stakeholders, often including regulators, government ministers, funding bodies, boards of directors, landholders and the community. Planning frameworks and models can guide the location, type and amount of work needed to achieve an environmental outcome to the satisfaction of many stakeholders. Yet some questions regarding the on-going environmental outcomes and benefits achieved by these projects may be less well answered, so the perpetual question of ‘why should we invest?’ remains. Monitoring and evaluation combined with effective reporting (MER) can assist. However, MER is technically challenging when projects are implemented at the site scale and results are expected at the catchment scale, and, typical MER metrics may not satisfy the needs of stakeholders whose focus is on the financial benefits.
Seqwater, the bulk water supply authority of southeast Queensland, is currently implementing a MER program across 17 different catchments. The program has been designed to support Seqwater’s ongoing investment into catchment rehabilitation projects that aim to reduce catchment-derived risks to in-stream water quality. The program monitors the condition and performance of different interventions (catchment rehabilitation projects) using surveys specific to different intervention types which include: riparian revegetation, bank stabilisation, landslip stabilisation and wastewater projects. The performance surveys have been designed to show whether the interventions are doing the role it was intended to do and therefore whether the rehabilitation site is following the desired trajectory. The condition and performance data are managed via particular tools, which allows the project outcomes to be translated into benefits that are meaningful to stakeholders. Although the MER program is increasing confidence of stakeholders in supporting ongoing investment to improve and protect in-stream water quality, certain challenges still remain.