About river sediment reloading and SMMAR Union for the Aude River

On this week, we visited the stream Orbieu in South of France with the SMMAR – Syndicat Mixe des Milieux Aquatiques et des rivières de l’Aude and students of the anthropized ecosystems master from Toulouse 3 University, involved in the teaching unit of ecological engineering under supervision of Magali Gerino (aquatic ecology) and Dov Corenblit (river geomorphology and ecology).

The SMMAR unon is the public authority in charge of the management and restoration of the subwatershed of Orbieu stream. The main issue of this stream is the lack of sediment due to several year of sand and gravel collection in the river bed as natural resource for building purpose.

Since this practice became forbidden in France, the SMMAR is seeking for nature based solutions to recover the sediment that used to make part of the river bed. This sediment is important because it is supporting the natural service of water quality regulation, shelter the fishes nesting areas and prevent from bank erosion.

Sources: https://www.smmar.org/

Orbieu reach with rocky bed that results of missing mobile coarse sediment

Master student with SMMAR during a field exploration for ecological engineering teaching 

INOWASIA is an Erasmus + Capacity Building Higher Education project that promotes a joint action of 11 organisations across 5 countries (Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, France and Spain) to train a new generation of water professionals in Southeast Asia. More info