Bridging the Gap between Policy and Science in Assessing the Health Status of Marine Ecosystems

Borja, Ángel; Elliott, Michael; Snelgrove, Paul V. R.; Austen, Melanie C.; Berg, Torsten; Cochrane, Sabine; Carstensen, Jacob; Danovaro, Roberto; Greenstreet, Simon P. R.; Heiskanen, Anna-Stiina; Lynam, Christopher P.; Mea, Marianna; Newton, Alice; Patrício, Joana; Uusitalo, Laura; Uyarra, María C.; Wilson, Christian

doi:10.3389/fmars.2016.00175

Cited by 52 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 141 publications

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“…The EU Marine Strategy aims at maintaining "oceans and seas which are clean, healthy and productive" (European Union, 2008). While a definition of ocean health in is lacking in the EU MFSD, the assessments are guided by a definition of Good Environmental Status, and multiple metrics of status and pressures are aggregated into indices to provide diagnostics on environmental status (Borja et al, 2016;Heiskanen et al, 2016). However, this framework is resource-demanding and, therefore, very difficult to automatize or implement at the global scale.…”

Section: Implementation Of the Assessment Of Ocean Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This is an approach developed in industrial failure analysis, where multiple sensors are integrated into a meta-sensor, defined as a virtual sensor that compresses the information from several sensors in an optimal manner (Butters et al, 2015). Integrated, meta-indicators have been developed in the context of marine biodiversity assessments in European seas (e.g., Andersen et al, 2014;Borja et al, 2016;Heiskanen et al, 2016;Uusitalo et al, 2016). Developing such meta-sensor of ocean health requires big-data approaches allowing machine learning algorithms, such as deep-learning, to feed on multiple cases of failure of marine ecosystems around the world including time series of data of the various candidate indicators to be integrated.…”

Section: Implementation Of the Assessment Of Ocean Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Perspectives on a Global Observing System to Assess Ocean Health

2018

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Concern over the deterioration of the oceans has generated a demand for a system able to assess ocean health globally, and approaches to assess ocean health globally and an observing system delivering the data to support this assessment are now being developed. In parallel with public health systems, a system to assess ocean health should evaluate the occurrence and severity of a set of syndromes of concern through a series of indicators composed from a parsimonious set of ecosystem essential ocean variables delivered by a coherent and robust observing system. The development of such approach for the global assessment of ocean health will help inform policies acting upon the drivers causing ocean syndromes and help ensure a healthy ocean for all.

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Section: Implementation Of the Assessment Of Ocean Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Implementation Of the Assessment Of Ocean Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perspectives on a Global Observing System to Assess Ocean Health

2018

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“…The "total ecosystem approach" to monitoring is a coherent evidence-to-advice package, supported by a fully-integrated ecosystem monitoring programme, and potentially a way to implement many of the new approaches identified above (Borja et al, 2016;Kupschus et al, 2016). At the center of this package is a dynamic model of the ecosystem function and its responses to pressures based on process relationships.…”

Section: The Future Of Monitoring Total Ecosystem Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Review of the Tools Used for Marine Monitoring in the UK: Combining Historic and Contemporary Methods with Modeling and Socioeconomics to Fulfill Legislative Needs and Scientific Ambitions

et al. 2017

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Marine environmental monitoring is undertaken to provide evidence that environmental management targets are being met. Moreover, monitoring also provides context to marine science and over the last century has allowed development of a critical scientific understanding of the marine environment and the impacts that humans are having on it. The seas around the UK are currently monitored by targeted, impact-driven, programmes (e.g., fishery or pollution based monitoring) often using traditional techniques, many of which have not changed significantly since the early 1900s. The advent of a new wave of automated technology, in combination with changing political and economic circumstances, means that there is currently a strong drive to move toward a more refined, efficient, and effective way of monitoring. We describe the policy and scientific rationale for monitoring our seas, alongside a comprehensive description of the types of equipment and methodology currently used and the technologies that are likely to be used in the future. We contextualize the way new technologies and methodologies may impact monitoring and discuss how whole ecosystems models can give an integrated, comprehensive approach to impact assessment. Furthermore, we discuss how an understanding of the value of each data point is crucial to assess the true costs and benefits to society of a marine monitoring programme.

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“…Threats Budgetary constraints are the most significant and obvious threat to monitoring within EU Member States (e.g., thus giving rise to what has been termed the "monitoring requirement paradox, " that there is an increasing amount of governance requiring monitoring while at the same time monitoring budgets have been cut (Borja et al, 2016;Strong and Elliott, accepted). For example, even where monitoring is undertaken within networks with standardized protocols (e.g., MEDITS and MEDPOL), budgetary constraints can result in countries suffering from data gaps over several years (see also de Jonge et al, 2006).…”

Section: What Are the Threats And Opportunities Of The Existing Marinmentioning

confidence: 99%

European Marine Biodiversity Monitoring Networks: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats

et al. 2016

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By 2020, European Union Member States should achieve Good Environmental Status (GES) for 11 environmental quality descriptors for their marine waters to fulfill the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). By the end of 2015, in coordination with the Regional Seas Conventions, each EU Member State was required to develop a marine strategy for their waters, together with other countries within the same marine region or sub-region. Coherent monitoring programs, submitted in 2014, form a key component of this strategy, which then aimed to lead to a Program of Measures (submitted in 2015). The European DEVOTES FP7 project has produced and interrogated a catalog of EU marine monitoring related to MSFD descriptors 1 (biological diversity), 2 [non-indigenous species (NIS)], 4 (food webs), and 6 (seafloor integrity). Here we detail the monitoring activity at the regional and sub-regional level for these descriptors, as well as for 11 biodiversity components, 22 habitats and the 37 anthropogenic pressures addressed. The metadata collated for existing European monitoring networks were subject to a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis. This interrogation has indicated case studies to address the following questions: (a) what are the types of monitoring currently in place? (b) who does what and how? (c) is the monitoring fit-for-purpose for addressing the MSFD requirements? and (d) what are the impediments to better monitoring (e.g., costs, shared responsibilities between countries, overlaps, co-ordination, etc.)? We recommend the future means to overcome the identified impediments and develop more robust monitoring strategies. As such the results are especially relevant to implementing comprehensive and coordinated monitoring networks throughout Europe, for marine policy makers, government agencies and regulatory bodies. It is emphasized that while many of the recommendations given Patrício et al.European Marine Biodiversity Monitoring Networks here require better, more extensive and perhaps more costly monitoring, this is required to avoid any legal challenges to the assessments or to bodies and industries accused of causing a deterioration in marine quality. More importantly the monitoring is required to demonstrate the efficacy of management measures employed. Furthermore, given the similarity in marine management approaches in other developed systems, we consider that the recommendations are also of relevance to other regimes worldwide.

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Bridging the Gap between Policy and Science in Assessing the Health Status of Marine Ecosystems

Cited by 52 publications

References 141 publications

Perspectives on a Global Observing System to Assess Ocean Health

Perspectives on a Global Observing System to Assess Ocean Health

A Review of the Tools Used for Marine Monitoring in the UK: Combining Historic and Contemporary Methods with Modeling and Socioeconomics to Fulfill Legislative Needs and Scientific Ambitions

European Marine Biodiversity Monitoring Networks: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats

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