Contact conveners
Over the last few years, implementation of the MSFD has become an increasingly important driver of marine science in Europe as the status of marine ecosystems have been assessed, good environmental status defined, indicators of status developed, and monitoring programmes designed. Future challenges include the development of management measures and systems to oversee the implementation of measures and monitor their success.
These efforts dovetail with the adoption of integrated ecosystem assessment and management by ICES and its increasing involvement in developing biodiversity science and advice. Although in principle several stages of implementation are already complete, many issues need to be resolved and many scientific questions have arisen.
Topics covered by this session will include:
- appropriate definitions of good environmental status (GES), given that pristine conditions have not existed in living memory
- the choice of appropriate indicators for, amongst others, non-indigenous species and food webs
- accounting for effects of climate change on marine communities
- designing effective monitoring programmes for benthic communities and marine mammals
- the mismatch of scale between current regional fishery management and the local-scale impacts of fishing
- coping with uncertainty
- the role of novel (e.g. metagenetic) techniques in measuring biodiversity
- assessing GES
- management measures to mitigate the cumulative impacts of human activities
