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Poster presented during the H2020 "MUSES" project stakeholder workshop ’Embracing opportunities – Ocean Multi-Use Action Plan development workshop’ (Venice - June 27th, 2018). The poster analyses the potential for development of Multi-Use in the Northern-Adriatic coastal waters by combining existing and innovative touristic services with other traditional economic sectors and assets on the area. Drivers, added values, barriers, and impacts of Multi-Use have been identified integrating desk analysis and stakeholders perception. The results show the existence of a good potential for Multi-Use development and Blue-Growth in the area, still limited by barriers, particularly in the field of legislation, administrative processes and stakeholders capacity. Needed actions at local and regional (sub-national) level are highlighted in order to exploit this potential.

The aims of this work are to provide an overview of the current stresses of estuaries in Argentina and to propose adaptation strategies from an ecohydrological approach. Several Argentinian estuaries are impacted by pollutants, derived mainly from sewage discharge and agricultural or industrial activities. Anthropogenic impacts are expected to rise with increasing human population. Climate-driven warmer temperature and hydrological changes will alter stratification, residence time, oxygen content, salinity, pollutant distribution, organism physiology and ecology, and nutrient dynamics. Good water quality is essential in enhancing estuarine ecological resilience to disturbances brought on by global change. The preservation, restoration, and creation of wetlands will help to protect the coast from erosion, increase sediment accretion rates, and improve water quality by removing excess nutrients and pollutants. The capacity of hydrologic basin ecosystems to absorb human and natural impacts can be improved through holistic management, which should consider social vulnerability in complex human-natural systems.

Assessing Biodiversity Declines Understanding human impact on biodiversity depends on sound quantitative projection. Pereira et al. (p. 1496 , published online 26 October) review quantitative scenarios that have been developed for four main areas of concern: species extinctions, species abundances and community structure, habitat loss and degradation, and shifts in the distribution of species and biomes. Declines in biodiversity are projected for the whole of the 21st century in all scenarios, but with a wide range of variation. Hoffmann et al. (p. 1503 , published online 26 October) draw on the results of five decades' worth of data collection, managed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature Species Survival Commission. A comprehensive synthesis of the conservation status of the world's vertebrates, based on an analysis of 25,780 species (approximately half of total vertebrate diversity), is presented: Approximately 20% of all vertebrate species are at risk of extinction in the wild, and 11% of threatened birds and 17% of threatened mammals have moved closer to extinction over time. Despite these trends, overall declines would have been significantly worse in the absence of conservation actions.

Bottom trawling in the Mediterranean Sea has compromised the availability of demersal fishery resources, primarily due to decades of overexploitation beyond sustainability thresholds. Low selective bottom trawl nets have exacerbated this situation by catching large numbers of under-sized or immature individuals of targeted and not-targeted commercial species that are subsequently discarded. EU legislation requires EU Mediterranean countries to recover demersal fish stocks to sustainable levels by January 2025. This is a challenging requirement under current management scenarios that mainly focus on reducing fishing hours, compromising the activity of the fleets. While social networks among fishing fleets and fisherman associations are essential for facilitating the transition to sustainable exploitation, improving the selectivity of bottom trawl gears is proposed as a viable option beyond reducing fishing hours. This study presents the benefits of improving bottom trawlers net selectivity in multi-species NW Mediterranean coastal and deep-sea fisheries to reduce the catch of non-commercial sizes and discards. Data from selectivity experiments and literature review, fish market landings and a regional monitoring program in the FAO geographical sub-area 6 were used. Results indicate that in the short term, enhanced selectivity leads to an increase in the proportion of fish that are closer to their minimum conservation reference sizes or sizes at maturity, while minimising the impact on commercial catches. Sustainability may be achieved, though beyond 2025, with measures complementing selectivity. These include the adoption of semi-pelagic otter doors to mitigate the impact of trawlers on the seabed and the expansion of no-take marine reserves to ensure habitat recovery and spillover effects Field sampling was funded by the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food and Ministry of Ecological Transition through the Spanish General Directorate of Fisheries. [...] The ‘Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence’ accreditation (CEX2019–000928–689 S) is also acknowledged 14 pages, 6 figures, 5 tables, supplementary material https://doi.org/10.1016/j.marpol.2024.106185.-- Data Availability: Data will be made available on request Peer reviewed

The Antarctic Peninsula is one of the most rapidly warming regions on Earth, as evidenced by a recent increase in the intensity and duration of summer melting, the recession of glaciers and the retreat and collapse of ice shelves. Despite this, only a limited number of well-dated near shore marine and lake sediment based palaeoenvironmental records exist from this region; so our understanding of the longer-term context of this rapid climate change is limited. Here we provide new well-dated constraints on the deglaciation history, and changes in sea ice and climate based on analyses of sedimentological proxies, diatoms and fossil pigments in a sediment core collected from an isolation basin on Beak Island in Prince Gustav Channel, NE Antarctic Peninsula (63°36′S, 57°20′W). Twenty two radiocarbon dates provided a chronology for the core including a minimum modelled age for deglaciation of 10,602 cal yr BP, following the onset of marine sedimentation. Conditions remained cold and perennial sea ice persisted in this part of Prince Gustav Channel until c. 9372 cal yr BP. This was followed by a seasonally open marine environment until at least 6988 cal yr BP, corresponding with the early retreat and disintegration of the ice shelf in southern Prince Gustav Channel. Following isolation of the basin from 6988 cal yr BP a relatively cold climate persisted until 3169 cal yr BP. A Mid-late Holocene climate optimum occurred between 3169 and 2120 cal yr BP, inferred from multiple indicators of increased biological production. This postdates the onset of the Mid-late Holocene climate optimum in the South Shetland Islands (4380 cal yr BP) and the South Orkney Islands (3800 cal yr BP) suggesting that cooler climate systems of the Weddell Sea Gyre to the east of the Peninsula may have buffered the onset of warming. Climate deterioration is inferred from c. 2120 cal yr BP until 543 cal yr BP. This was followed by warming. Superimposed on this warming trend, the instrumental record of recent warming at nearby Hope Bay is mirrored by a recent increase in the lake’s primary production and a shift in the diatom communities in the uppermost 3 cm of sediments, suggesting that this is amongst the first records to show an ecological response to recent rapid temperature increase. These new constraints on glaciological and climate events in Prince Gustav Channel are reviewed in the context of wider changes in the Antarctic region. Peer reviewed

This paper assesses the applicability of the Frame of Reference (FoR) approach for the environmental monitoring of large-scale offshore Marine Renewable Energy (MRE) projects. The focus is on projects harvesting energy from winds, waves and currents. Environmental concerns induced by MRE projects are reported based on a classification scheme identifying stressors, receptors, effects and impacts. Although the potential effects of stressors on most receptors are identified, there are large knowledge gaps regarding the corresponding (positive and negative) impacts. In that context, the development of offshore MRE requires the implementation of fit-for-purpose monitoring activities aimed at environmental protection and knowledge development. Taking European legislation as an example, it is suggested to adopt standardized monitoring protocols for the enhanced usage and utility of environmental indicators. Towards this objective, the use of the FoR approach is advocated since it provides guidance for the definition and use of coherent set of environmental state indicators. After a description of this framework, various examples of applications are provided considering a virtual MRE project located in European waters. Finally, some conclusions and recommendations are provided for the successful implementation of the FoR approach and for future studies.