Combined effects of human pressures on Europe’s marine ecosystems

Abstract

Marine ecosystems are under high demand for human use, giving concerns about how pressures from human activities may affect their structure, function, and status. In Europe, recent developments in mapping of marine habitats and human activities now enable a coherent spatial evaluation of potential combined effects of human activities. Results indicate that combined effects from multiple human pressures are spread to 96% of the European marine area, and more specifically that combined effects from physical disturbance are spread to 86% of the coastal area and 46% of the shelf area. We compare our approach with corresponding assessments at other spatial scales and validate our results with European-scale status assessments for coastal waters. Uncertainties and development points are identified. Still, the results suggest that Europe’s seas are widely disturbed, indicating potential discrepancy between ambitions for Blue Growth and the objective of achieving good environmental status within the Marine Strategy Framework Directive.

Response of Food-Webs Indicators to Human Pressures, in the Scope of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive

“…In PT and SP units, anthropogenic pressures such as fishing (bottom trawl and mean fishing), seabed litter, sst, ssl, ph, and marine traffic explained food webs trends. Similar results were found by Korpinen et al (2021) for this region, identifying global warming (increasing sst), fisheries and shipping (underwater noise) as the major challenges that need to be addressed when considering cumulative anthropogenic effects. This region is characterized by narrow shelf areas (Korpinen et al, 2021), were trawling activities occur more intensely (Eigaard et al, 2017).…”

“…Similar results were found by Korpinen et al (2021) for this region, identifying global warming (increasing sst), fisheries and shipping (underwater noise) as the major challenges that need to be addressed when considering cumulative anthropogenic effects. This region is characterized by narrow shelf areas (Korpinen et al, 2021), were trawling activities occur more intensely (Eigaard et al, 2017). Studies on the ratio of the trawling footprint over the landings showed that the highest ratios occurred in the Iberian Portuguese area, reflecting the higher level of exploitation when compared with some of the Atlantic management areas where fishing effort has been reduced (Eigaard et al, 2017).…”

“…Geographically referenced data on relevant anthropogenic pressures occurring in the marine environment was retrieved for each spatial unit of assessment. The pressures considered were fisheries, climate anomalies, noise, and input of nutrients, as these are the source of the most prevailing effects exerted by human activities in the European seas (Halpern et al, 2008;Crise et al, 2015;Korpinen et al, 2021). The data collected, its source and the temporal range are showed in Table 2.…”

“…Healthy marine systems depend on monitoring plans and management measures that consider competing societal interests such as the sustainability and productivity of the systems, human well-being, and the development of human activities (European Commission, 2008Korpinen et al, 2021). Several policies and legal instruments have been developed for that purpose and, in that scope, the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), published in 2008 and revised in 2017, aims to implement an Ecosystem Based Approach (EBA) to the assessment and development of management measures in the European marine systems (European Commission, 2017a,b).…”

Molecular evidence for sweeping discontinuity between peracarid (Crustacea) fauna of Macaronesian islands and nearby continental coasts: over fifty candidate endemic species

“…Due to their small size and isolation, island and endemic species are more likely to extinguish than continental or nonendemic species [58]. Moreover, the human activities that mainly affect the marine environment usually take place in coastal areas, whose extension is limited and where the highest marine productivity is reached [57,59].…”