4.     Pressures, state and outlook

4.1.    Introduction

As highlighted in the previous Chapter, the added emphasis on ecosystem services represents a move away from perceiving water management within the traditional sectoral responsibilities of fulfilling an ever increasing human water demand and  providing adequate flood defences.  It is also clear that a good understanding of the spatial and temporal variability of water resources is an essential part of evidence based environmental policy making. The acknowledgement of variability as an inherit part of the water resources system necessitates the introduction of a more risk-based management framework, where concepts such as resilience and vulnerability should form the basis of future indicators rather than fixed target figures for water demand and flood defence levels.