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Subtask Description:
Prepare written documentation / output package.

Action points of the implementation:

Area:
Guadiana Estuary, Portugal (& Spain)

Policy Issue:
Management of the discharges of untreated wastewater into the estuarine environment

Human Activities:
Energy production, tourism, urban activity, agriculture and livestock farming, aquaculture.

General Information:
The estuary is the natural border between Portugal and Spain. On both sides of the estuary, especially in Spain, urban development is taking place, mainly associated with tourism and threatens to increase the inputs of pollutants, namely nutrients and bacteria.  Nutrient input is expected to change, not only due to fertilizer application on golf courses, but also due to the river discharge from a large dam, which has accumulated nutrients during its filling. On the Portuguese side, the construction of a large-scale WWTP, designed to serve several urban areas, was successively delayed since it is located within a protected area. The main stakeholder concerns relate to asymmetric development strategies of the two countries and the impact of activities taking place in the watershed on the estuarine and coastal water quality, which has consequences on tourism attractiveness, fisheries, or traditional salt farming.

Example of Implementation:
The dissemination and divulgation of the SAF implementation in the Guadiana Estuary encompassed the model development. The objective was to keep a great number of stakeholders in contact with the scientific team, assuring the relevance of the model outputs.
This process was accomplished by the publication of a website, containing all significant information regarding the SAF implementation in Guadiana Estuary and media news that were focused on the estuarine system. Also, a periodic Newsletter was distributed among a more than 100 entries mailing list, depicting past and current progress of the SAF implementation. These formats were outlined to increase the awareness of the audience.
To maximise even further the effectiveness of the SAF outputs, a multimedia application based on Adobe® Flash® was developed. This application, called GUADID v2, includes all the SPICOSA project description, SAF implementation in the Guadiana Estuary, Scenarios used, and a simplified and interactive final model version (Fig.1).


Figure 1: Screenshots of GUADID v2 environment. All contents are in Portuguese language.

The intrinsic Flash® capabilities allow the user an easy to explore information scheme, making GUADID v2 a self-explanatory tool for: SPICOSA project description, SAF implementation in the Guadiana Estuary stepwise narrative, Scenarios used portrayal and their meaning, and a simplified and interactive Guadiana model version.
The contents were carefully adapted to a more all-embracing language, hence requiring the translation of main concepts, modelling approaches, and basic assumptions. GUADID v2 structure is divided in four main chapters:

Several images and conceptual diagrams were used in order to explain relatively complex information. All information can be explored in more detail by reading available pdf files.
To create such application, the Guadiana Estuary team made use of its broad experience in developing multimedia applications of the same sort, more inclined towards environmental education.
As part of the Output Package, it is also made available GUADID v1, a prior version that gathers a great deal of knowledge divided in three main topics: Biology, Geology and Geography.
Guadid v2 was first distributed among the participants of the Stakeholder Forum, held on the 30th of June of 2010, through a Memory Stick. A demo version can be found here.

Comments:
The GUADID application is a very modern and impressive way to provide an output package for the stakeholders and at the same time to promote the implementation of SAF in a broader audience.

Contact: André Mascarenhas, apmascarenhas@ualg.pt.