Science to policy

Transfer of knowledge and results to the wider Atlantic stakeholder community and policy makers formed an integral part of the iAtlantic approach, implemented through a range of targeted events, open meetings, bilateral discussions and briefing documentation aimed at addressing specific policy-relevant issues.

During the project’s lifetime, a number of new policy initiatives, agreements and designations have changed the shape of ocean governance in the Atlantic region. iAtlantic followed these developments closely, participating at relevant meetings and promoting the role of science in decision-making, as well as seeking opportunities to feed specific project results into these processes.

In the international policy arena, parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) adopted the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) in December 2022, comprising a new set of agreed global biodiversity targets to be achieved by 2030, replacing the CBD’s Aichi Biodiversity Targets that expired in 2020. iAtlantic’s work has direct relevance for 9 of the 23 new GBF targets, which tackle spatial planning, ecosystem restoration, protected areas, adverse impacts, sustainable exploitation, climate change, management and use of wild species, pollution, sustainable fisheries and ecosystem services. A policy brief examining the relevance and application of iAtlantic results to the new GBF targets (Boteler et al. 2023) was published in December 2023, and was submitted as part of iAtlantic’s response to the CBD’s call for tools and guidance for Global Biodiversity Framework implementation (CBD Notification 2023/120; November 2023).

Also in December 2022, CBD Parties at COP15 approved 17 new ecologically or biologically significant marine areas (EBSAs) in the North-East Atlantic, adding to the portfolio of EBSAs worldwide, which already includes areas in the SW and SE Atlantic. Whilst EBSAs confer no management obligations, they signal relative significance of an area for its conservation value. For many of these areas, empirical data is limited and their significance has been inferred based on bathymetry and other proxies and analogues. iAtlantic outputs will help strengthen and update EBSA descriptions, contribute to any future discussions on the establishment of EBSAs in the Atlantic region, and help to inform the positions of States. iAtlantic has worked closely with the CBD Secretariat throughout the course of the project, responding to calls for information and presenting scientific findings on ecosystem connectivity at a side event at CBD COP15.

In a landmark moment for high seas protection, in June 2023 parties to the United Nations agreed a new treaty on the conservation and sustainable use of marine biodiversity in areas beyond national jurisdiction (the BBNJ Agreement, or High Seas Treaty). Having followed the treaty negotiation process closely over the preceding 10 or more years, members of the iAtlantic team were well placed to seize an opportunity to lead the organisation of a 2-day symposium ‘The High Seas Treaty: From negotiation to implementation’. Involving more than 500 participants in person and online, the symposium provided a neutral space to bring together more than 100 organisations from 50+ nations to discuss the opportunities and challenges in transitioning this historic agreement from negotiation to implementation. The event offered a collective statement from participants that welcomed the BBNJ Agreement and recognised its importance in safeguarding the health and sustainability of the global ocean and marine biodiversity, as well as expressing participants’ firm and collective commitment to its future implementation. A variety of outputs are expected from the event as well as future events building on the outcomes of this initial gathering of the BBNJ community.

The GBF, BBNJ Agreement and other relevant international agreements and frameworks are set against the backdrop of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). SDG14, Life Below Water, calls for advances in marine scientific knowledge and increases in capacity to provide the information needed to improve ocean health, support the sustainable management and protection of marine and coastal ecosystems to avoid significant adverse impacts, strengthen their resilience and inform restoration actions, and sets a minimum 10% protected area target for coastal and marine areas, based on the best available scientific information. The new knowledge generated through iAtlantic directly contributes to these objectives, as well as indirectly supporting progress towards SDG14 targets focused on economic benefits and development of developing countries, in particular Small Island Developing States and least developed countries.

Bringing the focus to a regional lens, iAtlantic has worked closely with the OSPAR Commission to help advance protection for deep-sea ecosystems in the north-east Atlantic. The North Atlantic Current and Evlanov Sea Basin Marine Protected Area (NACES MPA) was designated by OSPAR in 2021 to protect seabirds over an area of c. 600,000 km² but included only the water column. A subsequent proposal to extend protection to the seafloor included a large volume of biological and environmental data contributed by iAtlantic, including fast-tracked sample analyses from iAtlantic expeditions such as IceDIVA2, and information on biological connectivity between seafloor and water column. The proposal was successful and the MPA extension approved by OSPAR Parties in June 2023. iAtlantic scientists also input to OSPAR’s 2023 Quality Status Review (QSR2023 – a 10-year assessment of the environmental status of the North East Atlantic), providing specialist knowledge on the status of carbonate mound habitats.

iAtlantic is also relevant to the European Green Deal (EGD), a set of policy initiatives launched by the European Commission in December 2019 to make Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. The EGD recognises that enhanced international cooperation will be needed to address common global challenges such as climate, pollution, and biodiversity loss and seeks to strengthen the EU’s partnerships with other regions and countries, supporting a multilateral approach. This links to the EU Global Ocean Governance Strategy 2022, relating to green diplomacy and global leadership. Regarding biodiversity more specifically, iAtlantic results can be critical to inform the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 and its Action Plan as well as related EU policies. Specific biodiversity targets include protecting a minimum of 30% of the EU’s sea area and integrating ecological corridors, as well as establishing strict protection of at least a third of the EU’s protected areas (EU Biodiversity Strategy), restoring areas of degraded and carbon rich ecosystems, and protecting habitats and species (EU Habitats Directive), as well as substantially reducing negative impacts on sensitive species and habitats, including on the seabed, through fishing and extraction activities to reach a good environmental status (GES) (EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive). These issues were touched upon during iAtlantic’s stakeholder dialogue event at the European Parliament in March 2023.

Further south, iAtlantic has worked extensively with the Sargasso Sea Commission, one of iAtlantic’s Associate Partners. New knowledge generated by iAtlantic in the Sargasso Sea region is feeding into the Commission’s Socio-Ecosystem Diagnostic Analysis – an exercise to identify, quantify, and set priorities for environmental problems that threaten the long-term integrity and sustainability of the ecosystem.

At a national level, iAtlantic has contributed important data and analyses to planning and conservation initiatives, ranging from providing new seafloor survey data to support national planning exercises (Cabo Verde, Bermuda) to assisting with systematic conservation planning (Azores, South Africa). iAtlantic results have also provided new insights relevant for national fisheries management (Iceland, Brazil), informed the scoping of potential new protective measures (Bermuda), and provided national delegates from many countries (including beyond the Atlantic region) with the latest scientific information to inform their positions at international policy meetings. In South Africa, extensive stakeholder dialogue has helped to shift the dial on conservation planning and expanding the national MPA network, with many lessons learned that can translate to other regions and countries. Among many achievements, iAtlantic’s capacity development programme directly engaged researchers from west Africa, providing training in skills for national fisheries management; it provided new, low-cost video survey technology along with the necessary operational skills to researchers in Brazil and South Africa, and it has enabled the transfer of specialised expertise in cold-water coral taxonomy from Brazil to the European coral research community.

Contributing to sustainable Blue Growth

iAtlantic aimed to directly contribute the primary components – knowledge, tools and technologies – to support sustainable growth of ocean-based industries in the Atlantic: fisheries, aquaculture, the energy sector, mining, biotechnology, maritime and coastal tourism.

A key sector benefitting from the knowledge that iAtlantic has generated is the nascent deep-sea mining industry. Despite increasing interest in the potential mineral wealth offered by seabed mineral resources such as seafloor massive sulphides, polymetallic nodules and ferro-manganese crusts, very little is known about the impacts that mining would have on benthic and pelagic ecosystems and habitats. iAtlantic’s extensive experimental work on multiple and cumulative stressors has generated important new results of direct relevance to the current topics under debate at the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the body responsible for regulating deep-sea mining activities in international waters. These results have been published in peer-reviewed journals and summarised in a series of science briefs specifically aimed at Parties to the ISA. iAtlantic representatives attended relevant ISA meetings over the course of the project, providing signposting and access to scientific resources to help inform decision-making, and the project has provided input to the ISA’s public stakeholder consultation exercises.

iAtlantic’s work on habitat prediction, distribution of vulnerable marine ecosystems, ecosystem recovery after disturbance, and the observed and expected impacts of climate change on pelagic ecosystems – including fish populations – have direct application to fisheries management at international, regional and national scale. iAtlantic directly engaged with fisheries policy meetings at all levels, including at the UN General Assembly (UNGA) review of implementation of measures to address the impacts of bottom fishing on vulnerable marine ecosystems and the long-term sustainability of deep-sea fish stocks; supporting the EU in developing its proposals to the UNGA for enhanced management of deep-sea fisheries on the high seas to protect vulnerable deep-sea ecosystems, and providing results to the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) and the European Commission to inform discussions on the implementation of the EU deep-sea fisheries Regulation 2016/2336 to protect vulnerable deep-sea marine ecosystems in EU waters from the impacts of bottom fishing, which culminated in some 16,000 km2 of deep-sea areas in the Atlantic waters of the European Union being closed to bottom fishing to protect deep-sea benthic ecosystems. iAtlantic’s work was highlighted at the meeting of the Permanent Committee on Management and Science of the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission (NEAFC), and results are relevant for the 5-year review of NEAFC’s bottom fisheries regulation (Recommendation 19/2014) scheduled to take place in 2024. iAtlantic scientists have contributed to discussion and advances in the management of highly migratory oceanic pelagic species from the Atlantic Ocean at meetings of the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT), and at a national level have highlighted the impacts and risks of climate change to fish stocks.

iAtlantic has worked closely with the oil and gas sector from the outset, building a strong partnership with the International Association of Oil & Gas Producers (IOGP) to help broker agreements between industry operators and scientists around the sharing of commercial environmental data. Thanks to liaison between iAtlantic’s Advisory Board and Petrobras, important seabed multibeam bathymetry data were made publicly available for the first time – a particularly important resource for Brazilian researchers working on ecosystem mapping and habitat characterisation. Discussions with Petrobras regarding decommissioning plans and future contributions to deep-sea coral research in the South Atlantic are underway at the time of writing.

iAtlantic was funded as part of a portfolio of research projects tackling different aspects of Atlantic marine science. Aquaculture issues were not part of iAtlantic’s remit but are the focus of other projects within the All Atlantic family, and iAtlantic has worked to ensure that relevant results have been shared with the AquaVitae and ASTRAL projects.