Criteria of sustainable management of large river systems – ecological aspects and challenges of the 21st century

River systems maintain unique biotic resources and provide essential renewable water supplies for humankind. Flood pulses are the key natural drivers of species richness and productivity of the large river-floodplain ecosystems, but traditional water management has sought to reduce the natural variability of river flows to achieve more stable water supplies for socio-economic water needs. The increasing human pressure on river systems directly threatens the biodiversity of fluvial ecosystems across the world. Ecologically sustainable river management is aimed at maintaining the ecological integrity of the affected ecosystems while meeting the intergenerational human needs and sustaining the full array of other goods and services provided by natural river ecosystems. Several criteria of ecologically sustainable water management are outlined, such as the assessment of the reference status, the documentation of the deficiencies of the baseline conditions, the identification of the causes of ecosystem degradation using the DPSIR framework, the analysis of the compatibility of water needs, the definition of the target vision, etc