57It is at the stage of drawing up ecological quality ratios that the Member States divide the ecological quality ratios for each surface water category into five classes, by means of a limit value for the biological quality elements which shows the boundary between those different classes, namely high, good, moderate, poor and bad. The limit values are to be established following an intercalibration exercise, which involves comparing the classification results of the national monitoring systems for each biological element and for each common surface water body type among Member States in the same geographical intercalibration group, and assessing the consistency of the results with the normative definitions set out in Section 1.2 of Annex V to Directive 2000/60.
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