How agriculture, connectivity and water management can affect water quality of a Mediterranean coastal wetland

The Natural Park of Albufera (Valencia, Spain) is an important Mediterranean coastal wetland that suffers continuous environmental effects from human activities and water uses, mainly related to agriculture and urban/industrial sewage discharges. The aim of this research was to assess the water quality of the different aquatic environments of this wetland, taking into account the connection between them, the agricultural impact and the management of irrigation water. The UE Water Framework Directive was followed in order to evaluate the ecological and trophic status of water systems. Spatial approaches were used to integrate physicochemical data into GIS vector layers to map the more problematic points of pollution. The results showed a globally eutrophic system with poor ecological potential. The wetland is nutrient-overloaded during the entire rice cultivation period. Good-quality water inputs are deficient, since the river network already has high levels of nutrients and pollutants, especially in the northern area, where river water is mixed with inappropriate effluents from wastewater treatment plants. Agriculture and water management affected the area intensively up to the Albufera lake, modulating most of the studied variables. The information gathered here can help to optimize the global study and management of the coastal Mediterranean wetlands, which are highly linked to agriculture.

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Vera-Herrera L. Romo S. y Soria J. How agriculture connectivity and water management can affect water quality of a Mediterranean coastal wetland. MDPI, 2022. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12020486

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Retrieved: 21 Jan 2025 14:10:37
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Resource type Article
Date of creation 2024-11-05
Date of last revision 2025-01-21
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Metadata identifier f3dc9c2b-e826-5668-820e-4865a96660aa
Metadata language Spanish
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High-value dataset category Earth observation and environment
ISO 19115 topic category biota
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Name of the dataset creator Vera-Herrera, L., Romo, S. y Soria, J.
Name of the dataset editor MDPI
Other identifier DOI: 10.3390/agronomy12020486
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Email of the dataset creator vehelu@uv.es
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