Sensitive ecological traits to climate variability and fishing impact across European Atlantic and Mediterranean systems, embracing processes at population, community and ecosystem levelInternal

COMEDA

Activity Overview

Type: Working group
Start Date: May 5, 2015
End Date: May 8, 2015
Venue: Palma de Mallorca (Spain)
Contact: Manuel Hidalgo
E-mail: jm.hidalgo [at] ba.ieo.es
Funding Call: EuroMarine 2014 Call for Proposals
Decision Body: EuroMarine Steering Committee
Total Budget: €9,000
Funds Granted: €5,000

Manager(s): Manuel Hidalgo
Co-organiser(s): Marta Coll Monton, Hilmar Hinz

This working group will bring together 30 early career scientists, PhD students, post-docs and senior scientists to undertake comparative analyses between European Atlantic and Mediterranean marine ecosystems to move towards an Ecosystem-Based Approach to Fisheries Management (EBFM). Scientific questions from population through community to ecosystem level will be investigated, applying a comparative platform of research in the Atlantic and Mediterranean area. Key sensitive ecological processes to climate variability and fishing impact on Atlantic and Mediterranean ecosystems will be identified.

The event will result in a synthesis of new ideas within three topics: key population traits and dynamics of forage species affecting community and ecosystem functioning; the resilience-resistance trade-offs at different levels of biological organisation of forage fish; and biodiversity and ecosystem traits changes at regional scales. The outputs of the Working Group will provide key scientific information to operationally design management strategies under the framework of the EBFM and the Integrated Ecosystem Assessment of European regional seas. The present Working Group ensures the publication of high-impact scientific reports; at the moment six publications have been listed while additional publications will emerge following the meeting. 

 

Planned involvement of EuroMarine organisations

Manager

IEO

Co-organiser

IRD

Participants at the ICES COMEDA WG investigating sensitive ecological traits to climate variability and fishing impact across European Atlantic and Mediterranean systems: embracing processes at population, community and ecosystem level

COMEDA, the working group (WG) on comparative analyses between European Atlantic and Mediterranean ecosystems to move towards an ecosystem-based approach to fisheries, is an ICES WG formed in 2014. The objective of this meeting was to identify key sensitive ecological processes to climate variability and fishing impact issues on Atlantic and Mediterranean ecosystems.

Within this context, five topics have been developed; population traits that stabilise and shape demersal fish community dynamics, patterns and drivers of functional diversity of fish communities, biodiversity and ecosystem trait changes at regional scales, stabilising dynamics of forage fish communities, and functional diversity in benthic ecosystem. The group defined objectives for next year that focus on developing and completing final analyses and/or first drafts of scientific documents for these studies. The WG will benefit from the large network of collaborations established to develop new scientific initiatives. The WG has produced communications to ICES in 2013 and 2014, with more documents submitted in 2015. Several scientific publications have already been envisioned for the different topics of the WG. 

Update

  • (October 2016): The production of two main papers is underway, which are the product of the work developed under the three years of ICES WG COMEDA and for which EuroMarine funded the 2nd year meeting in Palma:
  • (October 2016): This ICES WG will continue for another 3 years. Some of the topics that were initially discussed in the meeting in Palma are still and will be ongoing and mid-term work for some of the members of the group during this second period of WG.
  • (October 2017): The following paper was published with the partial funding of the EuroMarine grant: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/geb.12587/abstract. The WG has continued working since 2015 under the funding of each participant. All reports can be downloaded from: http://www.ices.dk/community/groups/Pages/WGCOMEDA.aspx.

Final involvement of EuroMarine organisations

Manager

IEO

Co-organiser

IRD
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