At its June meeting Core-Group members discussed the Draft Water Catchment Management Plan (WCMP) for the Maltese Islands which is required by the EU’s Water Framework Directive (WFD).  Officials from MEPA and the Malta Resources Authority first gave an introduction outlining the main features of the WFD and then presented the draft WCMP.  This meeting opened up the consultation phase on the plan which will last till the end of the year.

The WFD requires the establishment of a Management Plan for each Water Catchment District. A water catchment district is an area of land where water from rain drains into a body of water such as groundwater, inland surface water and coastal waters. Through sub regulation 3 (1) of the Water Policy Framework Regulations (LN 194/2004) the whole of Malta has been designated as one water catchment district. Thus, Malta has one Water Catchment Plan covering the whole of its territory and the different water bodies.

The plan gives details of all the water bodies in the area, the environmental objectives established for those water bodies and the measures that will be adopted to achieve them. The principal goal of the plan is to achieve “good status” in all surface waters and ground waters by 2015.

The management measures defined in the plan will be implemented over the next 3 years and are targeted to provide a significant improvement in surface and groundwater status by 2015. During this period the implementation of the measures and their effectiveness in improving the water status will be monitored by means of a monitoring programme.

Following the presentation members of the Core Group made comments and asked questions to the officials present. Comments ranged from the process of treating sewage water, to a detailed analysis of systems of water catchment in domestic homes and industry.