How far off is truly integrated catchment system management? 

The current approach to water management in England is far from integrated – and clearly not working. Catherine Moncrieff looks at pioneering approaches from across the country and what we can learn from them.

Water is inherently difficult to manage. It flows and pools in awkward places, yet it is costly and carbon intensive to move. It transcends political boundaries, sectors and even its own natural catchments. Yet it is necessary to sustain life, natural ecosystems and economies.

In England, the management of water features in an alphabet soup of plans: WRMPs (Water Resources Management Plans), RBMPs (River Basin Management Plans), DWMPs (Drainage and Wastewater Management Plans), FRMPs (Flood Risk Management Plans), WINEP (Water Industry Natural Environment Programme)…and more. The result is a piecemeal approach to flooding, drought, pollution and restoring freshwater habitats.

With the River’s Trust State of Our Rivers report highlighting that no single stretch of river in England or Northern Ireland is in good overall health, and the Environment Agency’s chair recently citing the ‘horrifying’ prospect of facing a shortfall of 4 billion litres of water, we urgently need to get a grip.

Ambitions for catchment system management - A Fresh Water Future?

Many have been calling for – and indeed trialling – a more holistic, collaborative, and catchment-based approach to the management of water and land. One that aims to harmonise the goals of water and wastewater management with environmental protection, nature enhancement, agricultural production and housing and infrastructure development.

The Catchment Based Approach (CaBA), a policy framework launched by Defra in 2013 to improve the quality of the freshwater environment, has made great strides towards this ambition. As highlighted by the CaBA national steering group chairs elsewhere in this newsletter, CaBA has demonstrated the benefits of a multi-stakeholder, civil society led approach. It has brought together public bodies, businesses and community groups in over 100 catchment partnerships across the country to collate evidence and deliver catchment improvement projects. But CaBA has been massively underfunded by government and hasn’t had the authority to be able to address the scale of the water challenges we face.

During late 2023, CIWEM engaged over 350 practitioners and informed stakeholders of the wider water community in developing a ‘A Fresh Water Future’, a comprehensive review of the water sector designed to find consensus on high-level policy requirements for better water management. This work uncovered a significant appetite for an improved, spatially relevant, democratic and collaborative approach to water management.

A Fresh Water Future identified a need for something fundamentally transformational, with bold vision and leadership. It recommended that the next government should implement ‘catchment system management’, which brings together all actors in the system in a way that empowers them to be engaged and to act. This system should develop ‘overarching, coherent and investible plans’ for water management that draw on existing plans and frameworks. It should pool different funding sources and identify investment priorities for water management that achieve multiple outcomes and benefit communities.

This echoes CaBA’s call for a marked shift in approach, where the plethora of policy and plans relevant for water management are addressed in a more holistic way to achieve ‘optimal, cost-effective, and synergistic outcomes’.

This utopian world of water management is easy to dream up, but how can we make it a reality?

There are a few key questions that need answering:

• How do we better orchestrate multiple plans and funding streams?
• How to blend funding from different sources that are closely tied to disparate but linked policies and regulations?
• How should decisions be made, and who should be held responsible if things don’t work out?
• What sort of governance and legal structure might be needed?
  

There’s a real danger that catchment system management gets put in the ‘too difficult’ box of the next government. But that hasn’t stopped many pioneering groups and individuals trying to figure some of this out.

Catchment pioneers

Many examples of catchment and regional schemes that pool and govern funding are springing up across the country, making steps toward more integrated and accountable water management. Many have been driven by a desire to increase private sector investment in the water environment. While most are only focused around one or two water issues, they are throwing up some interesting insights around integration.

A shining example is the Wyre Community Interest Company (CIC), established in 2021 by the Rivers Trust to achieve a specified reduction in flood risk through natural flood management across farms in the Wyre catchment, Lancashire.

It has successfully built a finance and multi-stakeholder governance structure to manage the flow of £2 million for the delivery and maintenance of natural flood management measures, attracting funding from those that stand to benefit - including United Utilities, Flood Re, the Environment Agency, and Wyre Council. The Rivers Trust movement is establishing similar schemes in the Glenderamackin and Aire catchments, focused on reducing flooding in Keswick and Leeds respectively.

Interestingly, the Wyre set-up includes no funding from government agri-environment subsidies. It seems non-grant funding could offer a more attractive payment for farmers, particularly with Defra’s Environmental Land Management Scheme (ELMS) still in development at the time.

Since the Wyre CIC was established, Defra has launched its pilot ELMS ‘Landscape Recovery’ scheme. This provides funds for farmers covering over 500ha to club together and hash out plans for improving natural habitats on their farms. They’re given two years to attract private funding for their plans, bolstering agri-environment subsidies.

In the Darent valley in Kent, for example, a Landscape Recovery pilot is underway with the support of Kent Wildlife Trust and the South East Rivers Trust. A catchment-scale restoration plan is being developed with several partners, which will restore river habitats but also enhance aquifer recharge, boosting groundwater supplies, and delivering natural flood management. It is hoped that funding can be drawn from water companies and flood risk management authorities that will benefit from the scheme.

A more business-centric approach is taken by the Landscape Enterprise Network (LENS) model, established in parts of Cumbria, East Anglia and Yorkshire. LENS facilitates businesses to co-invest in landscape measures that benefit them, sharing the cost and risk of investment. In the Petteril catchment in Cumbria, United Utilities and Nestle are co-funding better soil management via a farmer dairy co-operative, reducing phosphate pollution for United Utilities and strengthening the resilience of Nestle’s diary supply. Again, the aim is to set up a CIC to grow and facilitate further ‘trades’. Again, the aim is to set up a CIC to grow and facilitate further ‘trades’.

Larger scale collaborative management

At a larger scale, regional water groups go some way towards integrated, multi-stakeholder water management - although the focus is water resources. Water Resources East (WRE) is deemed to be the most well established and advanced in terms of collaborative water management. It was first established by Anglian Water in 2014 in response to water scarcity in Eastern England. In 2019, a board and funding model were set up and established as a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee. It has over 150 members – private, charity, farmers, local authorities.

Whilst WRE has the scale to deal with wide ranging issues, it is still largely funded by water companies. so is seeking funding from multiple sources to justify spending money to benefit other sectors. It is establishing a Water Fund through the Norfolk Strategy Programme, with different sources of income for investing in nature projects.

Greater Manchester Environment Fund is another example of a regional, collaborative approach – but with a wider focus on environmental improvement. It was established to drive investment to support the aims of Greater Manchester’s ambition to create a carbon neutral and climate resilient city region.

Like WRE, it’s been set up as a charitable company limited by guarantee. This provided clear visibility and accountability but ensured its independence from the Greater Manchester Combined Authority, giving it the flexibility to access and attract different types of funding and support.

The governance includes a board of trustees which monitors the Funds’ progress and report quarterly and has ultimate responsibility for approving funding applications.

Emerging insights

I have barely scratched the surface of the very many emerging examples of catchment system management in this short article. But there are some useful insights that emerge.

Many of these examples are focused on one or two perspectives of water management, such as flood risk or water resources. Truly holistic water management is a way off. One way to tackle this might be to phase integration.

Firstly, combine funding overseen by the Environment Agency to achieve multiple catchment outcomes – including for Natural Flood Management funding and directed through the Water Industry Natural Environment Programme (WINEP). Then, look at expanding this to cover wider flood risk management funding, ELMS and finally private sector funding.

Despite the government’s ambition to increase private sector investment in climate adaptation and nature recovery, as heralded in its 2023 Green Finance Strategy, non-grant funding can be difficult to land. Businesses need a robust business case to invest, with risk-free, measurable outcomes. Otherwise, it slips into token CSR-type funding. Government policy and regulations need to step in and establish clear rules of engagement and outcomes for ‘nature markets’.

And government must fund the un-investable, i.e. provide the seed funding required to initiate, develop and administer these complex schemes. The government’s Landscape Recovery and Natural Environment Investment Readiness Funds have made a good start, but more will be needed to underwrite and incentivise elusive private revenue streams.

It's worth noting that significant private sector funding is already directed to river and catchment improvements through the Water Industry Natural Environment Programme (WINEP). But to date this funding has been tied to specific regulatory outcomes and not necessarily reflective of wider water-related challenges. This has made it tricky to combine with other funding and for water companies to hand over its administration.

With 70% of the UK’s area covered by farmland, another reflection is that true catchment system management is going to require very many farmers to come together and be a sold on it. It will need to make business sense and for many, still allow their farms to be highly productive. They’ll need certainty and transparency from government around agri-environment subsidies, and around stacking, additionality, and tax rules for ‘nature markets’.

It's messy, but it starts with accountability

Different structures for catchment system management are emerging at different scales, based on local needs and consensus, though most are overseen by some form of multi-stakeholder board. Given the varying characteristics of political boundaries, scale, geography and land use in catchments, the approach taken by government could be flexible, building on structures and partnerships that are well established and proven to work.

A Fresh Water Future suggested that existing catchment partnerships established through CaBA could be nested around regional administrative boards. The catchment partnerships would feed into plans and be focused on community engagement and practical delivery.

Whatever arrangement emerges, it’s important that it is outcomes-driven, working towards clear targets that contribute to national targets. Crucially, there must be clear accountability for the delivery of these targets, underpinned by appropriate and reciprocal legal duties to cooperate.

That will ensure true multi-partite collaboration and start to disentangle the plethora of plans and funding streams that water runs through.

Catherine Moncrieff is Policy and Engagement Manager at CIWEM.