Rapid assessment of river watershed health and vulnerability level for restoration strategy: A study of river systems in Indramayu, West Java, Indonesia

Climate change triggers a vulnerable level of a watershed. The assessment of watershed was conducted in rivers in Indramayu. Indramayu has terrible water quality due to several factors. The research aims to state the vulnerability level of Indramayu sub-watershed. The research analyzed several locations: Cimanuk sub-river and Muara Kali Prajagumiwang. The river health and vulnerability were assessed according to physical, land use, and water quality indicators in rivers. The other indicators are proposed according to the previous studies to enrich the future study result. The study finds out the possible future indicators: Watershed landscape, hydrology, stream geomorphology, aquatic habitat, and biological conditions. The research uses a watershed vulnerability sequential analysis to obtain the result. The study analyzes the parameter, problems, and triggering factors from the sites. The assessment of stream corridor involves the rare species, sensitive fishes, macro-invertebrates availability, fish movement, normalization, water quality, river-land interaction, water spring, and geomorphology. The research concludes that rivers in Indramayu indicate fair and restorable impacted sub-watershed characteristics. This condition indicates that the streams have bad water quality, but they still could support a sustainable environment if it restored. © Published under licence by IOP Publishing Ltd.