Conservation

The watershed perspective is integral to the environmental protection and conservation agenda because of the scope of its biogeographic area and the value of the interconnected ecological services that such areas provide. [...] The watershed perspective is integral to the environmental protection and conservation agenda because of the scope of its biogeographic area and the value of the interconnected ecological services that such areas provide. [...] These may be the lush vegetation in forests, the fauna that make homes out of these forest areas, and even the aquatic animals and microorganisms that belong in the narrowest of streams all the way to much larger lakes or seas toward which the collected water funnels into. [...] Considering the interconnected nature of ecological processes, the degradation of these ecosystems and the decline of living populations within will likely eventually contribute to the scarcity of resources on which human communities also depend. [...] Among the priority programs of this office, prioritizing watershed resources through integrated land-use planning allows concerned stakeholders and decision- makers to assess the optimum level of benefit that can be drawn from existing watershed and forest resources (including water supply for agricultural, domestic, and industrial purposes), while keeping the sustainability and the long-term heal.