Transitional waters North East Atlantic Geographic Intercalibration Group. Benthic invertebrate fauna ecological assessment methods.

Abstract

This report gives a technical description on the intercalibration (IC) process of the different benthic assessment approaches for soft sediment habitats (muds to sands) in transitional waters in the North East Atlantic Geographical Intercalibration Group (NEA-GIG) for type NEA 11 (Transitional Waters). Eight member states are involved: Belgium (BE), France (FR), Germany (DE), Ireland (RoI), the Netherlands (NL), Portugal (PT), Spain (SP), and United Kingdom (UK). In Spain, the competent authorities for the WFD application are the regions, as such, for the benthic macroinvertebrates assessment methods three regions have been considered: Andalusia (SP-An), Basque Country (SP-BC) and Cantabria (SP-C). Those member states proposed 7 approaches for IC: AeTV (DE), BAT (PT), BEQI (BE), BEQI2 (NL), IQI (RoI and UK), M-AMBI (DE and SP-BC), QSB (SP-C) and TAsBeM (SP-An). However, AeTV and BEQI are not intercalibrated as they assess benthic invertebrates at water body and ecosystem level, respectively, whereas the rest of methods assess the benthic status at sample level.