Environmental Systems and Societies

Topic 4: Water, food production systems and society

Table of Contents

4.1 Introduction to water systems 1

4.2 Access to fresh water 4

4.3: Aquatic Food Production Systems 7

4.4: Water Pollution 10

4.1 Introduction to water systems

● Discuss human impact on the hydrological cycle.
● Construct and analyse a hydrological cycle diagram.

Hydrological cycle: how it works, storages and flows

 How the hydrological ● As sun warms the Earth, liquid water evaporates
cycle is driven by solar ● Solar radiation drives the formation of clouds and weather
radiation patterns, allowing for precipitation

Storage ● Oceans
● Soil
● Aquifers
● Rivers
● Streams
● Atmosphere
● Glaciers and ice caps

Flow: transfer ● Advection: wind-blown movement

● Flooding
● Surface run-off
● Infiltration and percolations
● Stream flow and current
● Precipitation

Flow: transformation ● Evapotranspiration: liquid to water vapour

○ Total water loss from evaporation and transpiration
● Transpiration when water is lost as vapor through
organisms

Renewability of water depending on stores

Turnover time ● Time takes for a molecule of water to enter and leave part of the system
● Water can shift from being renewable to non-renewable easily when
poorly managed

Hydrological cycle: Anthropogenic impact

Agriculture ● Pesticides and fertilizers contaminate water

● Irrigation, infiltration, and runoff
○ affect recharge to groundwater, evapotranspiration

Deforestation ● Leads to decline in vegetation cover (to trap rainfall)

○ → reduced interception → more surface runoff in rivers and soil
erosion → increases likelihood of floods due to silted
Urbanisation ● Withdrawal and pollution of groundwater/ aquifers ○ Septics tanks, landfills,
fluid storage tanks
○ Sewage, wastewater
● Diversions, canals, dams and reservoirs
● Permeable surfaces are replaced with impermeable surfaces → increases
likelihood of flash floods

Ocean circulation systems

Ocean currents ● Movements of water both vertically and horizontally

● Important role in global distribution of energy and atmospheric exchanges

Surface currents ● Moved by wind

● Rotation deflects and increases circular movement

Difference in water ● Causes the ocean conveyor belt

densities (deep water ● Caused by salt
currents) ○ Warm water hold less salt → less dense and rises
○ Cold water holds more salt → more dense and sinks
● Caused by temperature
○ Upwellings: Warm water rises cold come up from depth to replace ○
Downwellings: cold water rises → warm replaced by warm water

Ocean conveyor belt ● Circulation of the ocean’s water that is largely responsible for the transfer
of heat from tropics to colder regions

Examples ● Warm Gulf stream moderates the climate of Northwestern Europe

● Humboldt current impacts climate in Peru
 4.2 Access to fresh water
● Evaluate the strategies that can be used to meet an increasing demand for fresh water.
● Discuss, with reference to a case study, how shared freshwater resources have given rise
to international conflict.

Access to freshwater supply

Uses of water ● Domestic purposes: drinking, washing, cleaning

● Agriculture: irrigation, supply for animals to drink
● Industry: manufacturing, mining
● Hydroelectricity: generate energy
● Transportations: Ships on lakes and rivers
● Marking boundaries: draw boundaries between national states

Factors contributing to ● Seasonal or year to year change

inequitable supply ● Geographical distribution: Proximity to coastal areas, rivers, lakes ○ Rainfall:
75% occurs in less than a third of world population
● Wealth: infrastructure and facilitates: distribution, treatment, sanitation

Cause of inequitable supply ● Increasing demand

Water Scarcity

Physical water scarcity ● Where water resource development is approaching, or has

exceeded unsustainable levels

Economic water scarcity ● Where water is available locally, but not accessible for human,
institutional or financial capital reasons

Threats to freshwater supplies

Climate change ● Disrupt and change rainfall patterns, cause further inequality
● Low water levels in rivers and streams, slow water flow
● Underground aquifers are exhausted

Industry ● Release pollutants into surface water bodies

● Release warm water into rivers which hold less dissolved oxygen
● Carries diseases such as cholera
Unsustainable abstraction ● Excessive irrigation cause soil degradation and salinization
● Fertilizers and pesticides pollute streams and rivers

How water supplies can be increased

Strategy Explanation Strengths Weaknesses

Reservoirs ● Stores water for ● Control floods ● Requires large amount

irrigation and drinking of land

Desalination ● Removes mineral ● No longer tapping into ● Expensive

components from aquifers ● Energy intensive
salinated water ● Available for coastal
areas

Artificial recharge ● Extra water can be ● Better water retention ● Energy intensive
of aquifers withdrawn then ● Less damaging than ● Susceptible to
injected and stored other strategies contamination

Rainwater ● Collect rainwater ● Relatively inexpensive ● Requires local

harvesting management
schemes

Water ● Recycling of greywater ● Reduces consumption ● Requires change in

conservation and demand attitude

Case Study on International Conflict: China’s Three Gorges Dam

Context ● Hydroelectric dam in Yangtze River, largest engineering projects

● Energy produced provide over 9% of all China’s output
● Over 60 million people dependent on the Mekong River for
livelihoods ○ Southeast Asia countries: Thailand, Vietnam,
Laos, Cambodia
○ Economic lifeline for subsistence agriculture and fishing

Environmental Concerns ● Pollution make water unsuitable for drinking and increase
eutrophication ● Yangtze dolphin extinct, Siberian Crane critically
endangered
● Lack of silt makes downstream river banks more liable to erosion
Political conflict ● Infrequent and unpredictable floods and droughts due to China
control ○ Flooding wrecked fish farms and equipment
○ Droughts threatened crop yields and harvest
● Requesting a joint management in the Mekong River Commission ○
Difficult to access information from China due to hydro-supremacy ○
Threaten the supply especially during the dry seasons
 4.3: Aquatic Food Production Systems
● Discuss, with reference to a case study, the controversial harvesting of a named
species.
● Evaluate strategies that can be used to avoid unsustainable fishing.
● Explain the potential value of aquaculture for providing food for future generations.
● Discuss a case study that demonstrates the impact of aquaculture.

Marine ecosystems and Food Webs

Why demand for aquatic food ● Population growth

resources are increasing ● Diet preferences: higher trophic level diets

Continental shelf ● Extension of continents under the seas and oceans, creates shallow
water
● 50% of oceanic productivity, 15% of its area

Photosynthesis by ● Supports a highly diverse range of food webs

phytoplankton ● Phytoplankton (primary producers) produces all food at the bottom of
ocean food chains

Productivity ● Highest rates of productivity found in coastlines or in shallow seas

○ Upwellings and nutrient enrichment of surface waters
occurs

Harvesting controversial species

Reasons to harvest species ● Achieving maximum yield to gain greatest economic return

Reasons to conserve species ● Biorights

● Contravene with international conservation agreements
● Species threatened with extinction

Case study on the harvest of controversial species: whale hunting

Problem in relation to whales ● Sustainability: Increasingly endangered

● National sovereignty: Conflicts arise about territorial rights
● Unethical: by-catch kill is cruel, whales are sad and able to suffer

International legislation ● 50,000 whales killed annually


Sustainable harvesting:
Inuit and whaling
Controversial harvesting:
Japan and whaling
Definition
Reasons for the
overexploitation of fish
Issues around aquaculture
Value of aquatic natural capital
Overexploitation
● 1982 International Whaling Commission (IWC) banned commercial whaling
● Central part of Inuit culture as it provides vital source of protein
● 10,000 Inuit permitted to kill 67 whales in one year
○ Sustainable hunting practice as bowhead whales are
not endangered
● Reasons for illegal hunting
○ Crucial to their sashimi and sushi industry
○ Claimed for ‘scientific research’
● Opposed by other countries in the International Court of Justice (ICJ)
○ Australia argued that Japan’s research programme was commercial
whaling in disguise
○ Japan argued that they impose cultural norms and that whaling
activities are sustainable
● ICJ ruled Japanese government must halt whaling programme
Aquaculture
● Farming of aquatic organisms in coastal and inland areas
involving intervention in the rearing process to enhance
production
● Commercial fishing informed by satellite, GPS, and fish finding
technology makes it faster to find fish
● Fishing fleets become larger with modern refrigeration techniques allow
fish to stay at sea for weeks
● Trawler drags huge nets over seabed and clearcutting it
● Loss of habitats
● Pollution (from feed, antibiotics, medicines added to fish pens)
● Spread of disease
● Outcompete native species and cause population to crash
● Escaped GMO species survive to interbreed with wild fish
● Disruption of natural food chains and webs
Fisheries
● Food for humans, protein intake
● People depend on fisheries for livelihood
● 70% of fisheries that are fully exploited can’t be recovered
Ways to make fish farming ● Livestock and poultry waste substituted for fish meal
more sustainable ● Predatory fishes eat other sources of food without depleting capital

Maximum Sustainable Yield

General Definition ● Amount of natural capital that can be extracted each year without
depleting the stock to appoint it is not replenishable

Definition in relation to ● Maximum amount that can be taken without permanently depleting
fisheries stocks

Sustainable Yield ● Difference in population from initial size to new population

SY = annual growth and recruitment - annual death and emigration
𝑡𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝑏𝑖𝑜𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑎𝑡 𝑡+1 𝑡𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝑏𝑖𝑜𝑚𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑎𝑡 𝑡𝑖𝑚𝑒 𝑡
SY = 𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑔𝑦
− 𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑔𝑦

Strategies are able to ● Increase the estimated biomass of severely distressed stocks
● Prevent further declines in the biomass of stocks facing moderate distress
● Reduce bycatch of non-target species or juvenile age cohorts of target stocks
● Protect and restore critical marine habitat such as mangroves

Carrying capacity depends on ● Reproductive strategy

● Indigenous resources of the habitat / ecosystem

Reasons for ● Population dynamics of target species predicted rather than

unsustainable yield / being quantitatively measured
harvest ○ Impossible to be precise about the size of the population
○ Estimates made on previous experience
● Model does not allow monitoring of the harvest in terms of age and sex
ratio
 Unsustainable Fishing Management

Collapse ● Improvement in technology

○ Boats, fishing gear, detection devices (e.g satellites)
● Increase in consumption and demand

Solutions ● Use of quotas

● Designation of marine protected areas
● Restriction on types and size of fishing gear

Case Study on Unsustainable Fishing Management: Newfoundland

Problem ● Technological advancement allow mass capture: 800,00 tonnes

● 6 cod populations collapsed
○ Lack of foresight and poor local administration

Solution ● 1977: extended fishing limits to 370km off its coast

● 1993: Moratorium suspended fishery activity
○ Affected 40,000 fishers, resulted in unemployment

Evaluation ● Governments often raised quotas to sat economic needs

● Populations remained depleted
○ Predatory eat juvenile cod, hinder potential for development

Case Study on impacts on aquaculture: Shrimp Farming in Thailand

Impact on humans ● Antibiotics overuse: pollute waterways, biomagnification

● Pumping of groundwater to shrimp farms cause depletion, water salinization, and
shortages

Impacts on ocean ● Bycatch: boats used to catch shrimp accidentally catch other fish, affecting wild fish
ecosystems populations and ecosystem
● Mangrove habitat destruction

4.4: Water Pollution

● Analyse water pollution data.

● Explain the process and impacts of eutrophication.
● Evaluate the uses of indicator species and biotic indices in measuring aquatic pollution.
● Evaluate pollution management strategies with respect to water pollution.

Sources of water pollution

Freshwater ● Agricultural runoff

● Domestic sewage

● Industrial discharge

● Solid domestic waste

Marine ● Rivers

● Pipelines

● Atmosphere

● Activities at sea (accidental or operational discharge)

Types of pollutants and their effect

Type Example Source Effect

Floating debris ● Plastic bags ● Industrial discharg ● Harmful to development and survival
& suspended ● Shipwrecks ● Domestic sewage of species
solids ● Clog feeding and respiratory
structures
● Suppress plant life by preventing light
to be absorbed

Organic ● Proteins ● Domestic sewage ● Decreases oxygen levels when

material ● Fats ● Agricultural runoff material flows downstream

Inorganic plant ● Phosphates ● Eutrophication

nutrients ● Nitrates ● Loss of biodiversity

Toxic metals ● Copper ● Industrial ● Bioaccumulation and

● Zinc discharge biomagnification in food chains
● Kill aquatic species or make them
Synthetic ● DDT ● Domestic Sewage infertile
compounds Pesticides ● Agricultural runoff
● Atmospheric input

Hot water ● Cooling water ● Changes physical property of water

discharged from ● Kills fish, changes biodiversity
power stations
Oil ● Accidental ● Contaminates ocean
discharges ● Reduces oxygen levels
● Species lose ability to repel water,
leading them to drown

Radioactive pollution ● Nuclear power ● Radiation sickness

station

Light ● Artificial lights ● Increases risk of death from predators

along coastal area

Noise ● Underwater ● Water ● Beaching of whales and dolphins

sonar transportation

Pathogens ● Bacteria ● Domestic sewage ● Health hazard to animals and humans

● Viruses

Biological ● Invasive ● Escape from ● Disease

pollutants species aquaculture ● Decimates indigenous species
● Migration via ocean
currents

Measuring water pollution

Direct ● Performed by monitoring level of pollutant itself

Indirect ● Measures of organisms in ecosystem and indicator species to measure the effects
of pollutants

Parameter Instrument What constitutes pollution?

Dissolved oxygen ● Oxygen meter ● Low: 10-50% oxygen saturation

pH ● pH probe/meter ● 5.5 - 8 pH (though this depends on

● Litmus paper the body of water specifically)

Temperature ● Thermometer ● High since colder water holds

more oxygen

Suspended solids ● Secchi disk (which measures ● Low

(turbidity) water transparency)

Biodegradability of organic materials

General definition ● Ability of organic substances and materials to be broken down into
simpler substances through the action of enzymes from microorganisms

Process ● Utilises oxygen = anoxic conditions and subsequent anaerobic

decomposition = formation of methane, hydrogen sulfide and
ammonia (toxic gases)

Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD)

Definition ● amount of dissolved oxygen required to break down organic materials in

a given volume of water through aerobic activity

Measuring process ● Take sample of water

● Measure oxygen level
● Keep the sample in a dark place at 20 degrees for five days
○ To prevent photosynthesis and production of further oxygen

● Re-measure oxygen level

● BOD is the difference between the two measurements
○ Reported in mg/L

What BOD Levels Indicate ● High BOD indicates:

○ many organisms are using oxygen for respiration
○ low dissolved oxygen levels
● Low BOD indicates:
○ few organisms are using oxygen for respiration
○ high dissolved oxygen levels
 Indicator species

Definition ● Aquatic plant and animal life that are susceptible to specific types and
levels of pollutants
● Indicates something about environment by presence, abundance, or scarcity

Biotic index ● Indirectly measure the quality of an ecosystem

○ Tolerance, diversity and relative abundance of a species

Trent Biotic Index 1. Collect stream animals using kick sampling

2. Identify animals collected
3. Assess the abundance of each species
4. The presence and abundance are used to calculate an index of cleanliness
a. 10 totally unpolluted, 1-2 indicates severe pollution
5. Use table to determine biotic index

Eutrophication

Definition ● Body of water becomes enriched with nutrients

○ Leading to structural changes in the ecosystem

Process 1. Excess Nutrients (nitrates and phosphates) enter the lake

2. Algal blooms grow due to high levels of phosphates
3. Oxygen depletes as algal block out light to plants
4. Algal bloom dies as it consumes by zooplankton and aerobic
bacteria 5. Species die, which uses up more oxygen by decomposers
6. Dead zone created because the water body is depleted of oxygen and
unable to support life
Impact

● Increased turbidity
● Loss of biodiversity
○ Death of aerobic organisms (fishes, invertebrates, macrophytes)
○ Death of higher plants (flowering plants, reeds)
● Depletion of dissolved oxygen

Feedback loops for Eutrophication

Positive Feedback ● More nutrients added → algae biomass increases → increased nutrient load
● Growth of algae blocks light → underwater plants die, creating more nutrients as
they decompose → increased growth of algae

Negative feedback ● Increase in nutrients → growth of plants that store nutrients in biomass → reduction
in nutrients
● Increase in algae → increase in species feeding on algae → decrease in algal
population

Red tides ● Coastal eutrophication if the algal blooms belong to the dinoflagellate
species ○ Algae produces toxins that kill fish and can make humans ill

Pollution Management Strategies for Eutrophication

Type Strategy Strength Weaknesses

Alter human Ban or limit detergents ● Solves/alleviates problem ● Difficult to reach a

activity with phosphates in from its root cause consensus within
household items companies
● Hard to influence people’s
behaviours to change
 detergent products

Stop leaching of slurry ● Difficult to monitor and

(animal waste) or sewage change human behaviour
(farmers won’t see the
immediate benefit)

Regulate Plant buffer zones ● Disperse and minimizes ● Requires land

pollutants between field and water the pollutants
courses to absorb excess
nutrients

Divert or treat sewage ● Enables pollutants to be ● Just because pollution is

waste away from lakes to removed from smaller diverted doesn’t mean it’s
streams and seas bodies of water not polluted anymore

Clean up and Aerate (pumping air) ● Encourages mixing and ● Expensive

restoration lakes to prevent oxygen exposure to light ● Difficult on the large scale
depletion

Restock ponds with ● Organisms can ● Expensive and difficult to

appropriate organisms outcompete native species manage