Preliminary assessment of the status of Romanian wetlands through the framework of habitat quality analysis

Despite their important role to offer multiple ecosystem services, throughout the history, wetlands were underestimated and were perceived as wastelands. Therefore, many wetland areas were drained and transformed into areas serving other purposes, e.g. farmlands, this process taking place even today. To assess the pressures exerted upon wetlands, the Habitat Quality (HQ) model of the InVEST framework was used. The analysis is based on High Resolution layers from Copernicus Land portal, which delineate the wetlands with a good precision. Therefore, we offer information for about 1420 km2, that were identified as wetlands in Romania, compared with the official area of over 8000 km2. The results are showing that a very high proportion of the Romanian wetlands are in a good condition (HQ=0.9-1), due to the great share of Danube Delta wetlands in national surface, while the average value of HQ index is about 0.76 for all wetlands, with a poorer state for wetlands outside Danube Delta and Lower Danube Floodplain, where average values of HQ are about 0.5 - 0.1, indicating their high susceptibility to pressure exposure state. The results are not compared with field data, future research being necessary, but this type of assessment is a good framework for decision makers in order to prioritize the conservation plans for as wetlands.