The updated River Basin Management Plans (RBMPs) were published in December 2022 under the Water Environment (England and Wales) Regulations 2017, which seeks to establish an integrated approach to the protection and sustainable use of the water environment.

During previous RBMP consultations, stakeholders highlighted an insufficient focus on estuaries and coasts (E&C) within RBMPs.

A ‘RBMP Estuaries and Coasts Information Pack’ has therefore been produced to help signpost and provide further guidance to stakeholders with a specific interest in the E&C environment. It focusses on opportunities or suggested mechanisms to support the delivery of the potential measures of relevance to E&C, either through direct actions within the E&C environment, or indirectly, by taking actions upstream and applying a ‘catchment to coast’ approach.

The Environment Agency would welcome any discussions with interested partners and stakeholders on how to implement the measures and would be happy to organise a virtual or face to face meeting:  please get in touch either to eve.leegwater@environment-agency.gov.uk or via the MS feedback form linked below.

By using this supporting document and working together, it is hoped that there will be more clarity as to what the specific E&C measures are and how you can contribute to ensure our water environment, from source to sea, and catchment to coast, is protected, enhanced, and restored.

FEEDBACK: The Environment Agency welcome your feedback on the document here via MS Forms: https://forms.microsoft.com/e/HkDZrfztK8. This is a good opportunity to tell the EA how useful the document is and what more we could do to help implement the estuarine and coastal measures.