The world's marine ecosystems are connected by an international shipping and transportation network. Commercial shipping provides significant economic benefits and opportunities and the distribution and intensity of commercial shipping is increasing.
There is a growing need to assess and mitigate the impacts of vessel activities on the marine environment to balance the benefits of this industry. Commercial and recreational vessel activities can produce stressors such as underwater noise, strikes, debris, aquatic invasive species, and chronic and episodic pollution. These impacts can act individually and together in space and time, resulting in cumulative effects – the collective effects caused by the combined results of past, current and future activities.
A cumulative effects assessment is needed to address the sheer volume and frequency of vessel movements, the interaction and summation of multiple impact pathways, and cumulative effects through time. Vessel activities can have transboundary impacts and successful mitigation efforts require coordination and collaboration between trade partners.
This theme session will convene expertise on the impacts of vessels and review the current state of knowledge and priority research needs for the future. Presentations will feature impacts of individual and multiple shipping-related stressors and applications of cumulative effects assessment frameworks, conceptual models, and management efforts related to marine shipping and vessel activities.
Presentations are invited on both the perceived and documented environmental and socio-economic impacts of marine transportation on marine ecosystems and coastal communities.