Aquatic ecosystems – such as streams, rivers and lakes, supply water and food, assimilate wastes, offer a means of transportation, generate energy, provide habitat for many species, and offer recreational opportunities for people. By taking advantage of these services that our aquatic ecosystem provides, humans have changed patterns in flow, altered stream channels, introduced non-indigenous species and pollution, thereby diminishing the systems ability to provide these services that our society values.

Protecting aquatic ecosystems effectively is a challenge because these systems are subject to complex interactions with the surrounding landscape. The ‘watershed approach’ has been adopted by the EICD and the Province of Manitoba as a means of managing aquatic ecosystems. A watershed is an area of land which shares a common aquatic system. Integrated watershed management planning (IWMP) is a tool used to balance the needs of society with the need to protect the aquatic ecosystem.