A blueprint for integrating scientific approaches and international communities to assess basin-wide ocean ecosystem status

Ocean ecosystems are at the forefront of the climate and biodiversity crises, yet we lack a unified approach to assess their state and inform sustainable policies. This blueprint is designed around research capabilities and cross-sectoral partnerships. We highlight priorities including integrating basin-scale observation, modelling and genomic approaches to understand Atlantic oceanography and ecosystem connectivity; improving ecosystem mapping; identifying potential tipping points in deep and open ocean ecosystems; understanding compound impacts of multiple stressors including warming, acidification and deoxygenation; enhancing spatial and temporal management and protection. We argue that these goals are best achieved through partnerships with policy-makers and community stakeholders, and promoting research groups from the South Atlantic through investment and engagement. Given the high costs of such research (€800k to €1.7M per expedition and €30–40M for a basin-scale programme), international cooperation and funding are integral to supporting science-led policies to conserve ocean ecosystems that transcend jurisdictional borders

Economic Instruments and Marine Litter Control

This paper provides a comprehensive up-to-date review of the literature on the economic instruments that can reduce marine litter. We assess their cost of implementation, level of effectiveness as well as indirect environmental and socio-economic effects (externalities) that may arise as a result of their implementation. The evidence points to an overall beneficial impact of environmental taxes on items such as plastic bags in terms of reduced use, as well as a corresponding low cost of implementation. In the same vein, deposit-refund schemes can achieve high return rates for bottles although at a relatively high cost (especially when the scheme targets a wide range of packaging types). In the case of municipal waste collection, a ‘pay-as-you-throw’ charge can be applied to incentivise waste reduction. In coastal areas, waste collection and treatment can be further supported by the collection of tourist taxes, although there is a high risk that these funds might be used for other purposes. In the fishing industry, rewards for fishing vessels that return waste to shore has been shown to both reduce marine litter as well as complement fishermen's income. Since the vast majority of marine litter comes from land-based sources and consists of plastic, economic instruments that target relevant sources of land-based litter more broadly stand to make the greatest contribution to marine litter reduction. The choice of an appropriate intervention is case specific, largely depending on the tackled source of pollution, the country's institutional characteristics and infrastructure, consumer preferences and habitual behaviour, and the economy's overall sectoral composition

Policy integration and knowledge use in the EU climate adaptation strategy

This deliverable reviews the policy integration and knowledge use in the EU adaptation strategy at the EU level. An understanding of policy integration and knowledge use in the EU adaptation strategy is essential when one considers its implementation. The effectiveness of the strategy will depend on actions in a wide range of policy areas that do not necessarily have adaptation to climate change among their primary objectives. The report examines the structure and logic of the adaptation strategy and explores how the concept of policy integration is reflected in practice in two policy areas of interest, coastal management and rural and cohesion policies

A blueprint for integrating scientific approaches and international communities to assess basin-wide ocean ecosystem status

International audienceAbstract Ocean ecosystems are at the forefront of the climate and biodiversity crises, yet we lack a unified approach to assess their state and inform sustainable policies. This blueprint is designed around research capabilities and cross-sectoral partnerships. We highlight priorities including integrating basin-scale observation, modelling and genomic approaches to understand Atlantic oceanography and ecosystem connectivity; improving ecosystem mapping; identifying potential tipping points in deep and open ocean ecosystems; understanding compound impacts of multiple stressors including warming, acidification and deoxygenation; enhancing spatial and temporal management and protection. We argue that these goals are best achieved through partnerships with policy-makers and community stakeholders, and promoting research groups from the South Atlantic through investment and engagement. Given the high costs of such research (€800k to €1.7M per expedition and €30–40M for a basin-scale programme), international cooperation and funding are integral to supporting science-led policies to conserve ocean ecosystems that transcend jurisdictional borders

A blueprint for integrating scientific approaches and international communities to assess basin-wide ocean ecosystem status.

Ocean ecosystems are at the forefront of the climate and biodiversity crises, yet we lack a unified approach to assess their state and inform sustainable policies. This blueprint is designed around research capabilities and cross-sectoral partnerships. We highlight priorities including integrating basin-scale observation, modelling and genomic approaches to understand Atlantic oceanography and ecosystem connectivity; improving ecosystem mapping; identifying potential tipping points in deep and open ocean ecosystems; understanding compound impacts of multiple stressors including warming, acidification and deoxygenation; enhancing spatial and temporal management and protection. We argue that these goals are best achieved through partnerships with policy-makers and community stakeholders, and promoting research groups from the South Atlantic through investment and engagement. Given the high costs of such research (€800k to €1.7M per expedition and €30–40M for a basin-scale programme), international cooperation and funding are integral to supporting science-led policies to conserve ocean ecosystems that transcend jurisdictional borders

An Archaeology of Predation. Capitalism and the Coloniality of Power in Equatorial Guinea (Central Africa)

In this chapter, I explore the long-term effects of global capitalism in a small region of Central Africa from an archaeological point of view. The region in question is the Muni Estuary, in Equatorial Guinea, a former Spanish colony, where a multidisciplinary research project has been carried out between 2009 and 2012 by the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC). Our project documented the history of the area between the beginnings of the Iron Age and the present post-colonial times. One of our main goals was to explore through material culture the consequences of several centuries of capitalist exploitation in the area. The archaeological record shows the development of a regime of coloniality throughout the nineteenth century that impoverished and eventually dispossessed the local communities—the same communities who had originally enjoyed a prominent position in the capitalist system of predation.Peer Reviewe