AMAre Plus
Action for Marine Protected Areas PlusProject presentation
In the Mediterranean Sea, the intensive use of maritime space calls for integrated management to avoid cumulative impacts and user conflicts. Maritime Spatial Planning (MSP) - the harmonization of human activities in marine areas - is advocated as a powerful approach to reach these goals. However, most Mediterranean countries have not yet gone through this process.
The objectives of this project are 1- to develop shared methodologies and geospatial tools for multiple stressors assessment, coordinated environmental monitoring, multi criteria analyses and stakeholders' engagements; 2- to translate these guidelines into concrete pilot actions and coordinated strategies in selected Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) to solve hot spots of conflicts affecting marine biodiversity and the services it provides. Transnational cooperation and regulations, development of coordinated best practices to deal with present and future drivers of changes in biodiversity and ecosystem services, coordinated monitoring, data access to share information and concrete stakeholder and users' involvement are the expected results.
The final aim is to scale up strategies and recommendations at transnational level adopting an ecosystem-based approach to MSP considering the goals of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) across MPAs. MPA managers, public institutions, and key stakeholders working within the MPAs will benefit from the results of the project.
Partnership
Lead partner
National Inter-University Consortium for Marine Science – CoNISMa (Italy)
5 Partners
11 Associated partners
18 Pilot sites
8 Countries
Key messages
For managers
- To better monitor and manage biodiversity and marine resources in new MPAs, coordinated management strategies are required;
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To better manage vulnerable areas, it is necessary to adopt common protocols for monitoring and developing best management practices;
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To create a well-connected Mediterranean MPA network MPA management plans must be more effective and coherent.
For policy
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To maximise the effects of protection on biodiversity, the project must contribute to the implementation of an effective MPA network;
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To develop a common Mediterranean vision, it is fundamental to support local actions and to adopt a coordinated approach;
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Creating an effective MPA network is instrumental to reaching the goals recommended by EU policies.
For science
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To better understand the biodiversity status, environmental variables, and human pressure distribution and intensity, partners will collect fine-scale data on biodiversity and will create a spatial geoportal;
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AMAre PLUS’ target is fully aligned with the objectives of maintaining marine biodiversity and natural ecosystems;
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Data collection and spatial analysis are essential to mitigate the effect of cumulative human pressures and understand the exploitation of natural capital.