A process for developing management procedures that may ensure environmental protection is discussed in light of current problems in conservation of the aquatic environment. This process provides an opportunity for determining clearly the role and objectives of science in environmental protection and deals explicitly with the problems to management of uncertain information. Feedback management procedures are advocated, and these should be developed so that they are sufficiently robust in terms of absolute performance. This is to ensure that the environmental objectives set to safeguard the public interest are likely to be met under feasible worst-case conditions despite incomplete knowledge. Three important principles should be incorporated into these procedures before a proposed activity (e.g. development, exploitation) is allowed to commence: (1) the initial level of the activity should be set commensurate with a high degree of confidence that it is ecologically sustainable, (2) the objectives of the regulatory system should be framed in terms of aspects of the state of the environment that can be estimated robustly, and (3) the regulatory framework should specify what actions are required given the state of the environment as observed through the monitoring programme.
Introduction