Forth

The Forth advisory group area includes all the land that drains into the rivers Leven, Devon, Forth, Carron, Avon, Almond, Esk, Tyne and the Allan Water, Water of Leith and Eye Water, plus the adjacent estuarine and coastal waters out to three nautical miles. It is an extensive and varied area, extending from Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park through Stirling, Falkirk, Clackmannanshire, Fife, the Lothians, and down into the Borders. In addition to surface waters, the Water Framework Directive also requires us to consider groundwater, which lies beneath the ground surface and provides part of the flow in many rivers.

The Forth Area Advisory Group comprises the representatives of the key stakeholders and responsible authorities for river basin management planning in the area. They hold regular meetings and have developed an area management plan for the implementation of the river basin management plan for the Scotland river basin district.

This page has information on:

The co-ordinator and first point of contact for the Forth AAG is:

Name: Shona McConnell
Office: Edinburgh
Tel.: 0131 273 7326

The Forth area management plan

The Forth area management plan has been developed by the area advisory group. It comprises a summary document, which will be underpinned by detailed catchment profiles. Information about individual water bodies can be found on our interactive map application.

Forth area management plan summary document

Available as pdf (2.0mb ) or view online below

Forth catchment profiles

Catchment profiles are being produced for each catchment to provide detailed information on the river basin planning pressures and the measures required to address those pressures. The profiles represent a source-to-sea summary of the catchment and therefore coastal water bodies are included in the appropriate catchment summary.

The purpose of the profiles is to co-ordinate on the ground action within each catchment to enable the river basin planning objectives to be achieved. Each profile contains an ‘areas for action’ table which lists the specific actions to be delivered.

A how to use guide (335kb ) has been developed which includes definitions of the more technical terminology.

The catchment profiles are live documents which will be updated; therefore the web version below will be the most recent.

Catchment profile	PDF	Last updated
River Forth	310kb	September 2011
River Carron	235kb	September 2011
Eye Water and Berwick Coastal	230kb	September 2011
River Almond	309kb	September 2011
River Avon	244kb	September 2011
Water of Leith	204kb	September 2011
Allan Water
East Lothian coastal
Edinburgh coastal
Forth Estuary (south) coastal
River Devon
River Esk
River Leven
River Tyne
South Fife Coastal
Stirling coastal
Forth Estuary and Firth of Forth

Area Advisory Group membership

Membership of the Forth AAG is determined by the range and type of pressures in the Forth area. Members include representatives from:

British Waterways
Chemical Industries Association
Clackmannanshire Council
Coal Authority
East Lothian Council
Falkirk Council
Fife Council
Forestry Commission Scotland
Forth District Salmon Fisheries Board
Forth Estuary Forum
Forth Ports
Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park
Midlothian Council
National Farmers' Union, Scotland
Perth and Kinross Council
RSPB
Scottish Borders Council
Scottish Government Rural Inspections and Payments Division
Scottish Natural Heritage
Scottish Rural Property and Business Association
Scottish Water
SEPA
Stirling Council
The City of Edinburgh Council
The Leven Trust
West Lothian Council

Membership is flexible. It will be possible for additional members to be co-opted for agreed periods to assist with the preparation of particular aspects of river basin planning. Such members can be co-opted onto the AAG for single meetings, to cover specific agenda items or for a short period to advise on a particular issue.

Area Advisory Group meetings

The Forth AAG meets regularly and provides a mechanism to support the production and implementation of the river basin management plan (RBMP) for the Scotland river basin district, and its co-ordination with other plans and programmes.

The date for the next meeting of Forth AAG is the 15 November 2011.

Previous meetings

The agenda, papers, presentations and action note from the last meeting of the Forth AAG held on 24 May are available below.

24 May 2011

Agenda (35k)
- Paper 1 - Forth AAG meeting action note 2 November 2010 (75k)
- Paper 2 - RBMP update - May 2011 (56k)
- Paper 3 - RFFT INNS briefing paper (288k)
- Paper 4 - Forth area advisory group action plan 11-12 (30k)
- 1 - RBMP update May 2011 (549k)
- 2- National diffuse pollution campaign (667k)
- 3 - Eye water priority catchment update (6.85mb)
- 4 - Forth district biosecurity plan (884k)
- 5 - Forth multiple benefits project (116k)
- 6 - Flooding (Introduction) (584k)
- 7 - Flooding (Flood risk management planning framework) (485k)
- 8 - Flooding (National flood risk assessment) (405k)
Action note (83k)

Further information

Significant water management issues (SWMI) (1.85mb)
Published in 2007, the report provides a comprehensive assessment of the threats to Scotland’s water and identifies the actions and improvements that are necessary to protect the water environment.

SWMI in Forth (62k)
Summary table of SWMI affecting water bodies in the Forth.

Early basin planning work
Information on early river basin management planning work, such as environmental and economic characterisation and Plan of Action.

Monitoring and classification
Information on how monitoring and classification are linked to basin planning can be found on the monitoring and classification pages.

Use the links on the left to visit other AAG pages.