Long-term monitoring projects of Brazilian marine and coastal ecosystems

Abstract

Biodiversity assessment is a mandatory task for sustainable and adaptive management for the next decade, and long-term ecological monitoring programs are a cornerstone for understanding changes in ecosystems. The Brazilian Long-Term Ecological Research Program (PELD) is an integrated effort model supported by public funds that finance ecological studies at 34 locations. By interviewing and compiling data from project coordinators, we assessed monitoring efforts, targeting biological groups and scientific production from nine PELD projects encompassing coastal lagoons to mesophotic reefs and oceanic islands. Reef environments and fish groups were the most often studied within the long-term projects. PELD projects covered priority areas for conservation but missed sensitive areas close to large cities, as well as underrepresenting ecosystems on the North and Northeast Brazilian coast. Long-term monitoring projects in marine and coastal environments in Brazil are recent (<5 years), not yet integrated as a network, but scientifically productive with considerable relevance for academic and human resources training. Scientific production increased exponentially with project age, despite interruption and shortage of funding during their history. From our diagnosis, we recommend some actions to fill in observed gaps, such as: enhancing projects’ collaboration and integration; focusing on priority regions for new projects; broadening the scope of monitored variables; and, maintenance of funding for existing projects.

Optimizing Optical Coastal Remote-Sensing Products: Recommendations for Regional Algorithm Calibration

“…For the central portion, all available in situ SPM data are from before 2013 and, therefore, before the satellites were launched (2013 for L8, 2015 for S2A, and 2016 for S3A). Patos Lagoon is part of a long-term monitoring project [69], and the SiMCosta program provides measurements taken by moored buoys, but these data are limited to the estuary and the number of measurements synchronous to the satellites' overpasses is still small. This limitation could be overcome by continuous and spatially distributed monitoring along the lagoon continuum.…”

Coastal Marine Monitoring Experiments at the National Research Council in Messina, Italy: 30 Years of Research

“…Very recently, another success story in environmental monitoring was the long-term coastal monitoring system established in Brazil [38], where a network of several institutions involved in marine and coastal research projects (Programa de PesquisasEcológicas de Longa Duracão-PELD) have joined their efforts to achieve the objectives of a clean, accessible and resilient ocean set by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in the framework of the Ocean Decade (2021-2030) [39,40].…”