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Home News The Water Forum – webinar on public participation in catchment management

The Water Forum – webinar on public participation in catchment management

The Water Forum is hosting a webinar on 3 February 2022 from 10:00 – 12:30 to discuss best practice in public participation in catchment management and why such engagement is essential to achieve the transformative changes necessary in the next decade for water, biodiversity and climate.

The Water Forum, a stakeholder body comprising individuals, environmental organisations, community groups and businesses who advise the Minister on water policy, is an advocate for the need for public participation and engagement in catchment management. Meaningful public engagement provides groups, businesses and individuals with an opportunity to input to the development and implementation of environmental actions at local catchment level for water, biodiversity and climate outcomes.

The Water Forum will host a webinar on 3 February at 10am to discuss how the gap can be bridged between the national policies and plans and the desire among citizens to deliver outcomes for the natural environment. Academics will present research on best practice in public participation and tools for delivering such participative and deliberative democracy programmes.

Organisations and community groups already involved in developing and delivering water and biodiversity plans and actions at local level will discuss their learnings and what further supports and frameworks will be required to achieve real progress towards meeting the objectives of national policies which impact water, biodiversity and climate.

‘The Forum would like to encourage anyone with a role in public participation, or who would like to learn more about approaches to public engagement for environmental outcomes, to attend the webinar’.
Connie Rochford, Water Forum member and acting Chair

Register

You can register for this event online

Agenda

Time
10:00	Welcome and introduction to the day
Session 1: Public participation for water quality, climate change mitigation and biodiversity
10:05	The Framework for Integrated Land and Landscape Management FILLM; Gretta McCarron
10:15	An introduction to best practice in public participation; Dr Patrick Bresnihan, Maynooth University
10:30	Participatory and deliberative approaches to climate mitigation – Imagining 2050 project; Dr Clodagh Harris, UCC
10:45	Deliberative democracy tools – Imagining 2050 project; Dr Alexandra Reves, UCC
11:00	Panel discussion and Q&A
11:25	Break and POLL
Session 2: Public participation in practice
11:30	Learnings from Ballinderry & Oriel Rivers and Coastal Catchment Association; Mark Horton, Rivers Trust Ireland
11:40	Roles of Catchment communities in protecting water, nature and heritage; Micheál O’Cinneide, Corrib Beo
11:50	Using biodiversity to engage communities on catchment actions; Sean Corrigan, National Federation of Group Water Schemes
12:00	Enabling community engagement and participation, learnings from the second cycle; Fran Igoe, LAWPRO
12:10	Panel discussion and Q&A POLL Results
12:25	Closing address

About author

EPA Catchments Unit

Administrator

The EPA Catchments Unit is based in Dublin, and the team is involved with catchment science, chemistry, ecology, hydromorphology, modelling, Geographic Information Systems and planning. We work with the wider EPA, all of our local authorities, the Local Authority Waters and Communities Office, the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government, and other public bodies and Departments to ensure we have the best available data and information about our catchments.

Who is involved?
Quite simply, everyone in Ireland has a role to play. This can be from something as simple as making sure you don’t pollute your local stream, or a local community working together to establish a Rivers Trust to enhance the rivers and lakes in their area, to a Government Department or Agency helping a Minister implement a new policy to help protect and enhance all our water bodies.

This website has been developed and is maintained by the Environmental Protection Agency, and is a collaboration between the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Local Authority Waters Programme.

Local Authority Waters Programme

The Local Authority Waters Programme coordinates the efforts of local authorities and other public bodies in the implementation of the River Basin Management Plan, and supports local community and stakeholder involvement in managing our natural waters, for everyone’s benefit.

Environmental Protection Agency

The EPA is responsible for coordinating the monitoring, assessment and reporting on the status of our 4,842 water bodies, looking at trends and changes, determining which waterbodies are at risk and what could be causing this, and drafting environmental objectives for each.

Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage

The Department is responsible for making sure that the right policies, regulations and resources are in place to implement the Water Framework Directive, and developing a River Basin Management Plan and Programme of Measures to protect and restore our waters.