Restoration of marine habitats
BENEFITS
Marine ecosystems are the home of habitats and species which are pivotal to life on Earth, such as meadows of Neptune grass, corals, or sponges. However, many of these marine communities are in a deficient state of conservation and damaged after decades of withstanding the impact of human activity.
This is true for corals, Gorgonia and sponges, among other sessile organisms, which have an invaluable role as architects and landscapers of sea bottoms as well as providing shelter areas and food to other species. For this reason, if these sessile species disappear, others do too.
In an attempt to revert this situations, no-fishing areas were established, in which fishing activities are permanently and entirely forbidden in order to allow commercial species to recover, such as hake, red shrimp, and scampi, and protect other species. However, habitat recovery is very slow, and, for this reason, it is vital to accelerate restoration processes.
In this mission we have an ally: marine restoration, which includes different actions aimed to revert the degradation of sea habitats and restore their natural values. It is not a default solution but rather the last step to complete the restoration of damaged natural resources.
Gorgonia
Coral
DEEP SEA HABITATS
Deep sea habitats provide shelter and food to many species and boost marine biodiversity, since they play a fundamental role in the vital cycle of many sea organisms. Besides, they offer economic and recreational benefits.
Deep reefs (habitat 1170) are one of the five types of marine habitats listed in Annex I of the Habitats Directive as natural habitats of community interest. This project endeavours to restore this habitat but will also focus on the restoration of soft bottoms (sand bed and mud beds) or mixed substrates.
ALLIANCES
Protecting and preserving these spaces is important for everyone. For this reason, one of the core values of the LIFE ECOREST is the active collaboration of the fishing sector, which is a cornerstone to successfully achieve the goals of the project. Specifically, one of the project’s partners is the Association of Fishers’ Cooperatives of Girona, which groups a series of cooperatives of fishers that work within the area of the scope of the project. The mission of the LIFE ECOREST project is to launch participative processes aimed at getting all stakeholders, both local and national, on board.
Besides, the collaboration of stakeholders of other sectors is sought for the recovery and conservation of marine habitats, as well as to communicate its relevance to the rest of the company.
OTHER PROJECTS AND RESOURCES
REDRESS: restoring deep-sea habitats to rebuild Europe's seas
In the deep ocean, crucial habitats for carbon sequestration are threatened by the impact of human activities, which threatens and compromises their contribution to climate change mitigation and the functioning of the global ocean. The REDRESS project aims to restore these ecosystems and rebuild the biodiversity of Europe’s seabed. This initiative, coordinated by the Università Politecnica delle Marche (UNIVPM), has 26 partners, including CSIC.
Term: 2024 – 2028
DEEP CORE PROJECT: recovery of reef ecosystems and awareness-raising plan for the integration of the fisheries sector in marine conservation
This project, coordinated by the NGO Coral Soul and supported by the Pleamar Programme promoted by Fundación Biodiversidad, focuses on restoring, conserving and monitoring the marine areas of the province of Granada included in the Natura 2000 Network. To this end, it carries out a programme for the accelerated recovery of the coral reefs through different actions that involve the fishing sector in marine conservation.
Term: 2024 -2026
RECOMAR: bases for the Restoration and Conservation of Seagrass meadows in the province of Málaga: `Cymodocea nodosa´
The project focuses on optimising techniques and developing tools for the recovery and monitoring of the meadows of this species, which has lost 30% of its global distribution in the last 150 years due to human activities. One of its focal points is the involvement of the management and fisheries sectors. European funds finance it through the Pleamar programme of Fundación Biodiversidad.
Term: 2024 -2026
AccPosidonia: establishment of a collaborative platform for advancing and improving large-scale `Posidonia oceanica´ meadow replanting techniques in the Mediterranean basin.
Developed by the ECOMAR Foundation, this project seeks to advance in techniques for obtaining transplant material for future replanting that will favour the conservation of Posidonia oceanica. In order to do so, it works on a system of public-private collaboration and the promotion of the active participation of the fishing sector and the general public. European funds finance it through the Pleamar Programme of Fundación Biodiversidad.
Term: 2024 -2026
CABALGA: innovative and inclusive measures for recovering and conserving benthic communities in the Mediterranean and the Galician Atlantic.
The CABALGA project, carried out by the Institute of Marine Sciences (CSIC) within the framework of the Pleamar Programme of Fundación Biodiversidad, implements and evaluates the feasibility of ecological restoration actions and mitigation of the impacts of artisanal fishing on benthic communities dominated by gorgonians, Posidonia oceanica and laminaria.
Term: 2024 -2025
MedCoral: first national programme for the knowledge, conservation and protection of corals
Corals around the world are at risk as a result of human activities, led by climate change, pollution and industrial fishing. In response to this situation, in 2007 the HyT association launched a series of projects, initiatives and actions to study, conserve and protect corals and the habitats they form along the Andalusian coastline.
Term: 2023 – Present
RESCAP I, II, III, IV and V Project: conservation and recovery of gorgonian and soft coral populations through ecological restoration and mitigation of fishing impacts
Throughout five phases developed between 2017 and 2022, the RESCAP project, led by the Institut de Ciències del Mar (ICM-CSIC), has developed an innovative method for restoring gorgonians and soft corals. In the last season, it has restored 1120 colonies in their natural environment, bringing the total number of gorgonians restored to over 4,000 in 5 years thanks to the close collaboration between the scientific and fishing sectors. It has been supported by the Pleamar Programme of Fundación Biodiversidad, which is financed by the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF).
Term: 2017- 2018 – 2019 – 2019 – 2020 – 2021 – 2022
IMPALHA I: impact of bottom longlining on benthic habitats in SCIs of the Natura 2000 network
The project has compiled information, characterising fishing activity and its relationship with the habitats present in the area, and has designed the studies to be carried out in a second phase. It has also disseminated, above all to the fishing sector, methodologies and tools for advising on the establishment of management measures associated with fishing activity. In this sense, the communication has also involved management bodies and NGOs.
Term:2022
Miticap I, II, III and IV project: cooperation between fishermen and scientists to mitigate impacts of fishing on sensitive marine habitats
The project, led by the Institut de Ciències del Mar del Mar (ICM – CSIC), has worked to mitigate the interactions of artisanal fishing on the most sensitive benthic habitats of Cap de Creus, through an exhaustive characterisation of the main fishing grounds, thanks to the close collaboration between scientists and fishermen. In addition, the feasibility of extracting lost or abandoned fishing gear that has been located has been explored, thus reducing ghost fishing. Four editions have been carried out in the framework of the Pleamar Programme of Fundación Biodiversidad.
Term: 2018 – 2019 – 2020 – 2021 – 2022
Project Restaura CORAL Spain: boosting blue entrepreneurship
This project has boosted the creation of blue economy enterprises by training and improving the participants’ entrepreneurial skills in innovative methods of marine environmental restoration, especially in coral remediation.
Term: 2019 – 2020
SEASTORE project: conservation and restoration of seagrass beds
The SEASTORE project: Conservation and restoration of seagrass meadows of the marine phanerogam Cymodocea nodosa works on updating the conservation status of the meadows, assessing the ecosystem services they provide and generating updated and standardised protocols for monitoring and restoration of this species in the Canary Islands.
Term: 2021-present
INTERESTING RESOURCES ON RESTORATION OF MARINE HABITATS
For some in-depth resources on restoration of marine habitats, you will find more reports, materials and links below.