Workshop on Stakeholder Engagement Strategy (WKSHOES)

The ICES Workshop on Stakeholder Engagement Strategy (WKSHOES) met online 22-24 June 2021 with the objective to organize the background information needed for SCICOM and ACOM to develop a formal ICES Stakeholder Engagement Strategy. Stakeholder engagement has taken an increasingly important role in ICES. There was a strong consensus in the workshop that stakeholder engagement is essential to ICES’ work, as has been captured by the most recent ICES Strategic, Science, and Advisory Plans. The question is how to do it best. While WKSHOES recognized the essential nature of stakeholder engagement for addressing environmental challenges, understanding human impacts and values, the group discussed the valid concern that if stakeholder engagement is done incorrectly, it could compromise the perceived objectivity of ICES science and its independence. Workshop participants challenged the idea of objective or “pure” science, but also recognized the practical need to have ICES advice be transparent and science-based. Participants also understand that when providing advice, tradeoffs have to be made that are informed by the different weights that stakeholders place on various management objectives. A key question related to a potential stakeholder engagement strategy is “Who is a stakeholder?” This report discusses several definitions and roles. A central challenge for ICES is recognizing that the network of stakeholders is a subset of the people impacted by ICES science and advice. The Stakeholder Engagement Strategy should therefore primarily focus on ensuring that people who are part of the ICES network have clear roles and responsibilities and that ICES performs its work fairly and transparently. However, participants also recognize the need to increase opportunities for diverse resource users and citizens to have clear avenues to engage with the different aspects of the ICES network. Considering and promoting diversity and inclusion and avoiding implicit bias are crucial in this process. It is also essential to define clear goals for stakeholder engagement in general, and tangible objectives for each engagement activity in particular. Engagement objectives already formulated in various ICES documents are outlined in this report, as well as recommendations for guiding principles that provide the overarching frame of reference for engagement. This Report serves as the primary output from WKSHOES, and represents the knowledge and opinions of workshop participants. WKSHOES recommends that in order to both complete the development of the strategy and conduct successful stakeholder engagement about it, a suite of communication activities is needed that should best be coordinated from a central contact point within ICES. WKSHOES recommends that after ACOM and SCICOM draft the strategy and obtain input from the ICES Council, a diversity of stakeholders should be invited to provide input on the WKSHOES report and the development of the Engagement Strategy. ICES should solicit input from stakeholders by early 2022 to agree on the contents of the Strategy and how it will be implemented. WKSHOES also recommends that a future Expert Group address the ongoing need to develop and communicate effective stakeholder engagement methods within the ICES network.Peer reviewe

Priorities for Mediterranean marine turtle conservation and management in the face of climate change

As climate-related impacts threaten marine biodiversity globally, it is important to adjust conservation efforts to mitigate the effects of climate change. Translating scientific knowledge into practical management, however, is often complicated due to resource, economic and policy constraints, generating a knowledge-action gap. To develop potential solutions for marine turtle conservation, we explored the perceptions of key actors across 18 countries in the Mediterranean. These actors evaluated their perceived relative importance of 19 adaptation and mitigation measures that could safeguard marine turtles from climate change. Of importance, despite differences in expertise, experience and focal country, the perceptions of researchers and management practitioners largely converged with respect to prioritizing adaptation and mitigation measures. Climate change was considered to have the greatest impacts on offspring sex ratios and suitable nesting sites. The most viable adaptation/mitigation measures were considered to be reducing other pressures that act in parallel to climate change. Ecological effectiveness represented a key determinant for implementing proposed measures, followed by practical applicability, financial cost, and societal cost. This convergence in opinions across actors likely reflects long-standing initiatives in the Mediterranean region towards supporting knowledge exchange in marine turtle conservation. Our results provide important guidance on how to prioritize measures that incorporate climate change in decision-making processes related to the current and future management and protection of marine turtles at the ocean-basin scale, and could be used to guide decisions in other regions globally. Importantly, this study demonstrates a successful example of how interactive processes can be used to fill the knowledge-action gap between research and management.This work was conducted under FutureMares EU project that received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 869300. The Mediterranean Marine Turtle Working Group was established in 2017 and is continuously supported by MedPAN and the National Marine Park of Zakynthos. The work of AC was supported by the Hellenic Foundation for Research and Innovation (H.F.R.I.) under the “First Call for H.F.R.I. Research Projects to support Faculty members and Researchers and the procurement of high-cost research equipment grant” (Project Number: 2340).Peer reviewe

PREPRINT - Stakeholder Engagement vs. Social Distancing - How does the Covid-19 Pandemic affect Participatory Research in EU Marine Science Projects?

In the realm of marine science, engaging with stakeholders (e.g. industry members, policy-makers, managers, NGOs) is in important method in many EU projects. This engagement has been severely affected by the Covid-19 pandemic in two ways. First, social distancing measures now forbid most of the hands-on participatory activities originally envisioned in projects. Second, the restrictions have caused hardships for the stakeholders working in fishing and related industries. To assess the impact of Covid-19 on stakeholder engagement activities in ongoing marine science projects, we posed the following questions: What problems has Covid-19 caused for the workflow and outcomes of current research projects, (ii) how have scientists responsible for stakeholder engagement coped with the situation, and (iii) if alternative stakeholder activities were implemented, how have these been evaluated? Our survey was conducted nearly two months after the onset of Covid-19 lockdowns. It addressed researchers who engage with stakeholders in EU projects, and delivers insights into the practical implications of Covid-19 for stakeholder engagement and the measures taken to tackle this new challenge. The paper specifically highlights the impacts of the pandemic on transdisciplinary research in marine science, outlines current coping strategies in different EU projects, and gives seven practical recommendations on how to maintain meaningful exchange with stakeholders in times of social distancing and lockdowns

Safeguarding future marine biodiversity and ecosystem services under climate change (FutureMARES)

FutureMARES brings together over 250 scientists from 32 partner institutions working across European and South American seas to provide innovative, science-based advice on how to rebuild marine biodiversity for climate change adaptation and mitigationPeer reviewe

Workshop on Implementation of Stakeholder Engagement Strategy (WKSTIMP)

WKSTIMP supports the ICES Stakeholder Engagement Strategy, through drafting elements for ICES Implementation Plan. The report defines a suit of actions to make the ICES Strategy work. If implemented successfully, a diverse and representative pool of competent, reliable and committed stakeholders will engage with ICES. All stakeholders will be able to contribute effectively based on a clear understanding of the process and what is expected from them. ICES will become a natural place for stakeholders to engage and collaborate, delivering better science and advice by integrating essential knowledge and providing arenas for meaningful dialogues. And, the engagement process will be fully traceable, and its monitoring and evaluation outcomes inform decision-making and organizational learning. The WKSTIMP participants represented a plurality of profiles and backgrounds including natural and social scientists, representatives from the fisheries sector, NGOs, Advisory Councils, ICES Head of SCICOM and ACOM and ICES staff. The analysis and reflective thinking on the Strategy set the basis for exploring actions within the ICES system (Expert Groups, Advice Drafting Groups, MIACO and MIRIA meetings) and across topics (research ethics, data protection, informed consent, conflicts of interest, transparency). The discussion in WKSTIMP highlighted the centrality of stakeholders as data, information and knowledge providers, and highlighted how two complementary ICES initiatives reinforce the Strategy: firstly, the development of guidelines for ensuring the integrity of scientific information submitted to ICES by data providers (e.g., WKENSURE); and secondly, the accountability for fishers and other stakeholders’ perceptions (forthcoming Workshop on perceptions on the dynamics of fish stocks in ICES advice, WKAFPA). Furthermore, participants discussed risks associated with opportunistic behaviour in the engagement processes (creative and created blindness and advice shopping), tailoring specific actions to cope with them. Exploring actions for implementation was guided by feasibility within the current ICES framework. Additional considerations were to avoid burdens, disruptions, and manage change in the ICES community. WKSTIMP proposes 35 time-based priority actions, urges the implementation plan's timely approval, and suggests strengthening ICES capability by creating an expert group on engagement. Potential actions developed by stakeholders beyond ICES provide synergies that could reinforce the Strategy.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio