An Taisce and the Green Party have warned that the €55 million angling industry in the west is seriously threatened by rapidly deteriorating water quality in the lakes.
Lough Corrib, which is also a major source of drinking water for Galway city, faces eutrophication because of pollution from farms, forestry and septic tanks,according to the organisations.
The Government's western river basin district project will not deliver results soon enough to prevent the deterioration, public representatives were told at a meeting hosted in Oughterard, Co Galway, by the Carra/Mask/Corrib Water Protection Group.
"The possible threat to the drinking water supply of Galway city is almost unthinkable. However, if urgent action is not taken, the balance of nature in Lough Corrib that has taken thousands of years to build up will be destroyed forever," Cllr Niall Ó Brolcháin, chairman of the Galway City Council's environmental committee said.
Anglers were "rightly concerned about the immediate threats to the brown trout hatchery and the ancient pearl mussels in the lake," he added.
"It is tragic that such species could be lost in such a short period of time due simply to lack of proper controls and understanding."
Cllr Ó Brolcháin added that: "Tens of thousands of people rely on Lough Corrib for their drinking water. It is simply not good enough that we should have to put up with increasing levels of chlorine as algae fed by pollution of our lake steadily destroy the quality of our water."
Mr Derrick Hambleton, chairman of An Taisce's Galway branch, said the proliferation of "urban-style" one-off housing developments in Co Galway was a major contributor to the contamination, along with phosphate fertilisers for forestry plantations and intensive farming. He was critical of promises by two Government Ministers who attended the meeting - the Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Mr Ó Cuív, and the Minister of State for Equality, Mr Frank Fahey - to facilitate meetings between fishery action groups and Government representatives. "To date, any meetings which have been held have produced no discernible action," Mr Hambleton said.
Mr Ó Cuív, acknowledged that there were concerns about water quality on the Corrib, but said that there were divergent scientific opinions about levels of contamination.
"I live beside the lake, I drink water from it, I care passionately about it, but I also believe that significant efforts to address the issue can be made at a bilateral level," Mr Ó Cuív said.
He said certain obvious elements, such as sewage treatment, could be expedited.
