The GES4SEAS project aims to inform and guide marine governance to minimize human pressures and impacts on marine biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. It also seeks to ensure the sustainable provision of ecosystem services during this process.
Coastal and marine waters are vital for the planet's natural balance and human societies. The goods and services provided by all coastal and marine ecosystems largely depend on the levels of human and environmental pressures and their cumulative impacts.
GES4SEAS will bring together relevant actors and stakeholders to develop an innovative, adaptable, and flexible toolkit within the framework of adaptive Ecosystem-Based Management. Stakeholders and competent authorities will co-create and validate this toolkit by integrating it into an Implementers' Advisory Board.
The 11 Learning Areas will serve to test, validate, demonstrate, and upscale this toolkit in the four European regional seas (the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Baltic, and Black Sea) as well as the Caribbean Sea.
Through these tools, GES4SEAS aims to achieve Good Environmental Status (GES) and support policies at the national, European, and global levels.
Project website: https://www.ges4seas.eu/
Keywords: Cumulative pressures, Biodiversity Strategy, Climate change, Ocean literacy, Ecosystem services, Integrated ocean health assessment.
