The MEECE project is launched
16th October 2008
During the first week of October the Marine Ecosystem
Evolution in a Changing Environment (MEECE) project, coordinated by
Plymouth Marine Laboratory, was launched in San Sebastian, Spain.
This European Commission Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) follows
on from the recently completed EUR-OCEANS project, funded by the
European Commission’s Sixth Framework Programme, and aims to
investigate the potential responses and sensitivities of marine
ecosystems to both climatic change and the direct effects of
humans.
By investigating the change drivers (temperature, changes in ocean
circulation & stratification, ocean acidification, pollutants,
consequences of overfishing, invasive species and eutrophication,
as set by the European Union’s marine strategy) the project aims to
gain a better understanding of the interplay of these factors at
different levels of organisation i.e. fish, plankton, benthos;
essentially what is the most important to the marine food web now
and what will be the most important in 50 or 100 years time. This
information will in turn allow the development of innovative
predictive management tools and strategies to help marine
organisms, policymakers and society adapt to the changing marine
environment.
Icarus Allen, Head of Science at PML and MEECE
Project Coordinator commented: “Marine ecosystems are changing so
we need to gain the knowledge necessary to learn how to live with
it. For the 1st time this project is attempting to use predictive
models and herd all these drivers together to answer ecosystem
response questions in a holistic manner rather than investigating
driver by driver. Essentially it’s a more synergistic strategy at
bringing these drivers together.”
“If we don’t understand how the ecosystem will respond to the
multiple drivers in the future we will find it very difficult to
manage the marine ecosystems. This maybe the secret to
understanding and managing coastal marine ecosystems, biodiversity,
environment health, fisheries and all sorts of other benefits we
gain from the ocean.”
There are 21 European partners including from the UK, the Sir
Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean Science, National Oceanography
Centre, Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory and the Centre for
Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture.