The MISTIC SEAS 3 project promoted, on October 22 and 23, its third seminar via online, due to the pandemic caused by COVID-19.
This seminar, which was attended by all the project partners, was aimed at discussing synergies and cooperation between the Macaronesia subregions, the Bay of Biscay and the Iberian Coast, trying to fill any gap.
The workshop was promoted and moderated and by Maria Vale from the Regional Fund for Science and Technology (FRCT) of the Government of the Azores. The first day began with the intervention of Camilo Saavedra, from the Spanish Institute of Oceanography (IEO), who presented Work Package 3 (WP3) 'Evaluation of biodiversity descriptors: D4 (trophic guilds), D1 (biodiversity) and D3 (commercial species)'. She also addressed the ‘Report on the integration of D1, D3 and D4 in Macaronesia’.
Afterwards, Izaskun Preciado, IEO scientist responsible for the evaluation of D 4, highlighted the advantage that the Macaronesian region has over the rest of the OSPAR regions, since it is only made up of two countries, facilitating coordination and agreement on methodologies. The implementation of some indicators proposed by OSPAR was discussed and what could be achieved in Macaronesia in the future in terms of what types of indicators to use and how to implement them.
Later, José Nuno Pereira, from the Direção Regional dos Assuntos dos Mar dos Açores (DRAM) presented the document 'Optimization of indicators and environmental risk for indicators D1, D3 and D4' and introduced the debate on the indicators evaluating the pros and cons of using different data sources (scientific surveys and landings indicators). It was concluded that it was necessary to compare the estimated indicators from scientific surveys and landings and focus on the species which you can obtain data from both surveys and landings. It was also concluded that more scientific recognition is needed.
During the second session, José A. Carvalho, Direção Regional do Mar da Madeira (DRM), presented the ‘Synergies and cooperation between subregions’, this final document is expected to be finalized by the end of November.
Last, Vanda Carmo, Direção Regional dos Assuntos dos Mar dos Açores (DRAM), presented the Specific Guidance document, where it was proposed to conduct a questionnaire to the competent European entities to implement the Marine Strategy Framework Directive, in order to evaluate and identify their main difficulties.
