Towards development of a water quality monitoring strategy for Mashreq and Maghreb countries

Abstract There is an immanent need to develop accustomed regional guidelines for Mashreq countries (Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, West Bank and Gaza) and Maghreb countries (Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) to enhance water quality monitoring (WQM) and information dissemination to institutions and decision makers. The purpose of this paper is to provide an outline for the developed WQM strategy for Mashreq and Maghreb countries. The implementation of these WQM guidelines is expected to achieve accurate and reliable water quality data coverage; improved access and dissemination of water quality information and its guidelines by stakeholders in forms that are suitable for influencing policy dialogue. Based on the needs of decision‐making and policy development issues, the WQM guidelines can be tailored for countries in the region. In addition, several international WQM guidelines and information dissemination strategies are considered as suitable modules that can be adopted to build regional guidelines for WQM. The final guidelines address namely three issues: monitoring program design, monitoring procedures, and information dissemination. Reviewing the available information proved that it would be impossible to come up with a generic WQM program or a network design that can be applied for the entire region (Egypt is considered as a guide case study). Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.