Environmental Health Report: 2022 Revisions to the alert-level framework for planktonic cyanobacteria in the ‘New Zealand Guidelines for Cyanobacteria in Recreational Freshwaters’
Summary
The ‘Interim New Zealand Guidelines for Cyanobacteria in Recreational Fresh Waters’ were released 2009. In 2018, the Recreational Cyanobacteria Guidelines were reviewed, with one of the recommendations being improvements to the alert-level framework (ALF) for planktonic cyanobacteria. The aim of the project was to revise the ALF for managing planktonic cyanobacteria in recreational waterbodies in-line with recommendations from the 2018 review. The majority of end-users who participated in the survey did not support the name change and it is recommended that it remains as is (a traffic light system).