Socio-political conditions for successful water quality trading in the South Nation River Watershed, Canada

Ontario’s South Nation River watershed has a regulated water quality trading programme. Legally, wastewater dischargers must not discharge any increased loading of phosphorus (P) into receiving waters. New wastewater systems are now choosing trading instead of traditional P removal technology, whereby point source dischargers buy P credits from rural landowners, primarily farmers. These credits are generated by constructing nonpoint source pollution control measures, and science-based formulae are used to calculate the credits of P removed by each measure. The chapter identifies the conditions necessary for the success of such a programme, drawing on ten years’ experience of this established scheme. An independent evaluation showed higher opinions of the programme had enhanced participants’ opinions of the broker and regulatory agency, and most farmers were willing to, or had already, recommended the programme to other farmers.