Preface to the special issue, ‘Sustainable Development on Water Resources Management, Policy and Governance’

Water is essential for sustaining human health, food and energy security, and ecosystem services. All living things need water to grow and reproduce, making it indispensable for life on Earth. However, population growth, economic development and technological advancements have increased the demand for water, whereas natural changes have made its supply unstable. Ongoing climate change will further exacerbate this problem, increasing uncertainty and making decision-making more challenging.

In addition to climate change, imbalances in power relations, limited availability of water resources, and socio-cultural and socio-economic disparities hinder sustainable water governance in many parts of the world. Environmental damage also affects policies and sustainable management of water resources, posing a severe threat to their availability and quality.

Sustainable development is crucial for managing water resources in all sectors, ensuring their availability for present and future generations. Therefore, it is essential to manage water resources sustainably, reconcile the interests of water users, and protect the natural environment from deterioration.

This special issue discusses some of the latest progress of sustainable development on water resources management, policy and governance that emerged from the 4th International Symposium on Water Resource and Environmental Management held over 10–11 December 2021 in Sanya, Hainan, PR China (WREM 2021).

After a meticulous peer-review process, 12 papers with high scientific value have been accepted for publication. They mainly concern sustainable development of water resources management, policy and governance.

Cheng (2023) investigate the landscape distribution characteristics and the total ecological water demand of Linghekou wetland based on the landscape pattern index and ecological water demand model, and explored the correlation between the two. The gray prediction model was then used to predict and analyse the future changes in the total ecological water demand of the wetland, in order to provide a scientific reference for the optimal allocation of regional water resources and the sustainable development of wetland resources.

Lin et al. (2023) discuss within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic the impact of coastal ecological resources on the development of the rural economy, tourism and leisure environment. Although it has been proven that the development of coastal waters can effectively enhance people’s positive awareness of current economic, social, environmental and coastal ecological development, and increase people’s willingness to revisit and purchase real estate, a number of additional activities can be taken to help achieve the goal of a sustainable circular economy for water. These include improving personal security, residents’ awareness of environmental protection and willingness to participate in decision-making, tourism construction, transportation, and hotel facilities, improve restaurant service quality, increase leisure opportunities, and solve waste problems.

Wu et al. (2023) provide a spatial evolutionary understanding of the development of recreational fishery, and on this basis provides guidance for the future development of the recreational-fishery industry, focusing mainly on Zhejiang, an important coastal province of China. It showed traffic, market and scenic-spot location significantly affected the distribution of recreational fishery in Zhejiang Province. Furthermore, population and economics also affected the spatial distribution of such fishery.

Zhang Y et al. (2023) investigate the ecological health and influencing mechanisms of Poyang Lake. It showed that the ecological health was mainly ‘good’ and remarkable seasonal differences were observed. The results indicated that scholars and policymakers should focus on both nutrient concentrations and hydrological conditions, which are the key factors influencing the ecological health of Poyang Lake.

Wang et al. (2023) establish a scientific and reasonable model framework for dynamic monitoring and ecological health assessment of wetlands, which is conducive to early warning, protection and management of wetland ecosystems. On the basis of the model it was concluded that the management and protection of wetland ecosystems in Harbin Fenghuangshan National Forest Park needs to be strengthened urgently.

Studies by Xu D et al. (2023), the comprehensive evaluation standard system of ‘Happy River’ (幸福河) is constructed by using the analytic hierarchy process (AHP), and an empirical study of several typical rivers (located in Shaoxing City, China) was undertaken. On this basis, the countermeasures and suggestions for promoting the construction of ‘Happy River’ are put forward, which provides a reference example for the sustainable management of rivers.

Zhang W et al. (2023) study the characteristics and the source of metals in wild fish in the South China Sea by correlating the concentrations of trace metals and stable isotopes. It showed that the selenium:mercury molar ratios exhibited noticeable species and spatial variation for the wild fish, whereas the main sources of tin and lead contamination might be antifouling reagents and surface applications.

Gao et al. (2023) take Gehu Lake, the sixth largest freshwater lake in Jiangsu Province, China, as an example to explore the influence of water quality in inflow rivers on the eutrophication in the lake from 2011 to 2018. The authors analysed the relationship between Gehu Lake and its main inflows rivers in terms of water quality using BATHTUB model and discussed the goal of collaborative control of water quality indicators (i.e. total nitrogen and total phosphorus) between the lake and its main inflow rivers by setting up different scenarios. The results showed the importance of total nitrogen and total phosphorus in the inflows on the concentrations that occurred in the lake. Decreasing the concentrations in the inflows led to decreases in the lake.

Zhu et al. (2023) evaluate the impact of large-scale dam construction on regional precipitation. The authors used geostatistical tools for analysing the regional precipitation data before and after the construction of the Xiaolangdi Dam and the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River, and adopted Wavelet transform and Yamamoto signal-to-noise ratio analysis. The result shows a strong correlation between the dam construction and regional precipitation, and the establishment of the dam affected the precipitation in the area ~200 km upstream and increased precipitation in this area.

In Liu et al. (2023), the application of remote sensing and geostatistics in urban water resources has been reviewed and summarised and its development projected. Bibliometrics were used to analyse the existing literature in this field. The use of remote sensing and geostatistics to improve urban water resources monitoring capacity was discussed, focusing on the classification of technologies and equipment and their applications in urban surface water and groundwater monitoring.

Yu et al. (2023) survey the current state of the input sources and the distribution characteristics of antibiotics in China, and then, to comprehensively evaluate and compare different treatments for the degradation and removal of antibiotics in the aqueous environment. The further optimisation and combination of the above methods is an important development direction in the future.

Xu H et al. (2023) use sediments dredged from Dalian Bay for the research. The strength, deformation and amount of moisture transferred by the solidified dredged marine sediment were measured and analysed and compared to the data for Portland cement. The results shows sulfate aluminium cement is characterised by great early strength, calcium vanadium stone plays a critical role in early strength development, as measured quantitatively for the mineral water form.

The guest editor of this special issue is thankful to the Editor-in-Chief of Marine and Freshwater Research, Max Finlayson, for providing the opportunity to publish selected peer-reviewed papers that were presented at WREM 2021. Thanks are also due to the journal’s Editorial Assistant, Kirsty Vance, as well as the entire production team of the journal for their valuable support in publishing this issue successfully. Last but not least, we express our sincere appreciation to all the reviewers for their invaluable and critical review comments on manuscripts that were submitted for this special issue.

Data availability

Data sharing is not applicable as no new data were generated or analysed during this study.

Conflicts of interest

The author declares that they have no conflicts of interest.

Declaration of funding

This research did not receive any specific funding.