EU MERLIN Partnership Announced

Forth Rivers Trust are delighted to be working with NatureScot to deliver the river restoration element of the EU MERLIN Project.  The Europe wide project is coordinated by the University of Duisberg-Essen, which seeks to restore the functions of freshwater and peatland ecosystems across Europe to help tackle the twin crises of nature loss and climate change and ensure a green recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic.

Over the next four years the Trust will work with NatureScot, the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH), the James Hutton Institute and the University of Stirling in partnership to restore freshwater habitats across the Forth catchment area.

The work will restore connections between rivers and their floodplains well as in-stream restoration upscaling the work undertaken on the Allan Water, connecting rivers to their floodplain, to contribute to natural flood management and the restoration of valuable wetland habitats.

A partnership agreement has been reached between NatureScot and the Trust to deliver the rivers part of the project over the next four years. The Trust will be working closely with landowners and other stakeholders including local authorities and agencies to identify sites, raise additional funding and deliver improvements.  The work will be monitored by CEH(UK), James Hutton Institute and the University of Stirling.

The rivers element of the Forth Case Study of MERLIN will be led by Huw Streater at the Trust and supported by other staff members bring a wide range of expertise to the project.

Alison Baker, Director of the Forth Rivers Trust, said: ‘The work which has been delivered through the Allan Water Project shows that these reconnections between rivers and the floodplains bring many benefits to nature and communities.  We are delighted to be working with the other partners in the MERLIN project to ‘upscale’ this work and bring about landscape scale change. The management of land and water is evolving, and this project can both deliver on the ground and provide important science-based evidence on the benefits this work can bring to the Central area of Scotland.’

For further information contact project staff here – Email Us