The follow-up article gives a summary of the project's key results after almost four years of research.
The article gives an overview of the results obtained by the project partners during the last four years, researching how Nature-based Solutions can contribute to safeguarding marine biodiversity in times of climate change. The project started off by understanding historic changes in species and habitats of the Northeast Atlantic, Baltic and Mediterranean Seas (Guillen Chust, AZTI). Modelled projections of warming and acidification, led by Momme Butenschön from CMCC, enabled partners to predict future climate change hotspots (high levels of warming) and refugia (low levels of warming) in all European Seas. Gil Rilov's research group at IOLR (Israel) focused on mechanistic responses of marine life to climate change, and the interactions between native and non-native species.
Based on these findings, new projections of climate-driven marine change and the productivity of marine species were developed under the lead of Ana Queiros (PML). This work lays an important foundation for the designation of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in European and Latin/South American countries, especially considering the EU's 2030 Biodiversity Strategy ('30 by 30'). Novel socio-ecological climate risk assessments (CRAs) highlight areas vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, and showcase how NBS can reduce risks across all species, regions and future scenarios investigated in FutureMARES.
FutureMARES provides the science-based advice needed to implement NBS and NIH (Nature-inclusive Harvesting of marine resources) as part of regional and local climate change adaptation and mitigation actions. These results were developed in cooperating with decision-makers, policymakers, and environmental managers to ensure their real-life relevance and applicability. Thus, FutureMARES will strongly contribute to national, EU, and global reports and policies to safeguard and restore marine biodiversity. The project helps to meet the targets of the EU 2030 Biodiversity Strategy and Nature Restoration Law. The consortium also recommends revisions to the EU Marine Strategy Framework Directive, proposing several improved ecological indicators of good environmental status (GES) and the inclusion of social-economic indicators for marine species and habitat conservation, habitat restoration, and the sustainable harvesting of seafood
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