• H2020
• Societal Challenges
• Bioeconomy

The seas and oceans are under pressure from a widening array of human activities, pollution and growing coastal populations. Such multiple pressures have created an increasing focus on coherent marine and maritime governance globally.

This is the conclusion of a study by the European Science Academies (EASAC) undertaken in collaboration with the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre, which is funded by Horizon 2020. The organisation adds that scientific understanding of marine systems is constantly evolving but there remain considerable uncertainties, and says that policy making and implementation must recognise these uncertainties and drive efforts to address them. The investigation looks at a number of key aspects for sustainable development in changing oceans and seas, and particularly highlights the key scientific challenges in addressing these issues.

While there is a need for an ecosystem-based management of marine environments according to the body, policy makers must be aware of the uncertainties and limitations in characterising marine ecosystem structure and function, and key physical and biological drivers. Furthermore, policy makers and scientists need to work together to define what level of disturbance is unsustainable, and this must also be based upon a combined understanding of the structure and functioning of ecosystems, and the connectivity of the marine system within and between EU member states’ marine waters.

To ensure that there is the scientific capacity to support the policy, EASAC recommends the establishment of a European marine university as a virtual institution, which should be charged with leading the development of enhanced graduate education, training and research in interdisciplinary integrative marine science.

EASAC also calls for policy makers to build knowledge on more ecologically efficient ocean harvest to meet the demands from growing populations. Options for ecologically efficient aquaculture or shifting harvest from predatory fish to lower levels in the food chain should be explored and policies such as those on deep sea mining and marine renewable energy development need to be informed by ongoing analysis of the impacts of different policy options, assessing environmental costs and uncertainties.

Public understanding of the importance of the ocean to mankind should also be enhanced as the basis for a better appreciation of the environmental costs of economic development. EASAC asks for more attention for ocean literacy and citizen science initiatives and strong emphasis on the development of communication and outreach skills in research funding.

The summary of the study constitutes a scientific contribution to World Oceans Day and a full report with detailed conclusions will be published later this year.