UNITED NATIONS UNEP/MED WG.474/3 UNITED NATIONS ENVIRONMENT PROGRAMME MEDITERRANEAN ACTION PLAN 24 Avril 2019 Original: English Meeting of the Ecosystem Approach of Correspondence Group on Monitoring (CORMON), Biodiversity and Fisheries. Rome, Italy, 12-13 May 2019 Agenda item 3: Guidance on monitoring marine benthic habitats (Common Indicators 1 and 2) Monitoring protocols of the Ecosystem Approach Common Indicators 1 and 2 related to marine benthic habitats For environmental and economy reasons, this document is printed in a limited number and will not be distributed at the meeting. Delegates are kindly requested to bring their copies to meetings and not to request additional copies. UNEP/MAP SPA/RAC - Tunis, 2019 Note by the Secretariat The 19th Meeting of the Contracting Parties to the Barcelona Convention (COP 19) agreed on the Integrated Monitoring and Assessment Programme (IMAP) of the Mediterranean Sea and Coast and Related Assessment Criteria which set, in its Decision IG.22/7, a specific list of 27 common indicators (CIs) and Good Environmental Status (GES) targets and principles of an integrated Mediterranean Monitoring and Assessment Programme. During the initial phase of the IMAP implementation (2016-2019), the Contracting parties to the Barcelona Convention updated the existing national monitoring and assessment programmes following the Decision requirements in order to provide all the data needed to assess whether ‘‘Good Environmental Status’’ defined through the Ecosystem Approach process has been achieved or maintained. In line with IMAP, Guidance Factsheets were developed, reviewed and agreed by the Meeting of the Ecosystem Approach Correspondence Group on Monitoring (CORMON) Biodiversity and Fisheries (Madrid, Spain, 28 February-1 March 2017) and the Meeting of the SPA/RAC Focal Points (Alexandria, Egypt, 9-12 May 2017) for the Common Indicators to ensure coherent monitoring. Decision IG.23/6 on the 2017 MED QSR (COP 20, Tirana, Albania, 17-20 December 2017) agreed, as general directions towards a successful 2023 Mediterranean Quality Status Report (2023 MED QSR), the following main recommendations: (i) harmonization and standardization of monitoring and assessment methods; (ii) improvement of availability and ensuring of long time series of quality assured data to monitor the trends in the status of the marine environment; (iii) improvement of availability of the synchronized datasets for marine environment state assessment, including use of data stored in other databases where some of the Mediterranean countries regularly contribute; and (iv) improvement of data accessibility with the view to improving knowledge on the Mediterranean marine environment and ensuring that Info-MAP System is operational and continuously upgraded, to accommodate data submissions for all the IMAP Common Indicators. Considering evolving needs to fill the gaps, in particular related to the harmonization and standardization of monitoring and assessment methods, the present document provides information on the monitoring protocols of the agreed Ecosystem Approach common indicators 1 and 2 to assess progress towards Good Environmental Status (GES). The present document is organized along three main monitoring guidelines of benthic marine habitats: (i) monitoring guidelines of marine vegetation (ii) monitoring guidelines of coralligenous and other calcareous bioconstructions (iii) monitoring guidelines of dark habitats Table of contents General premise .......................................................................................................................................... Purpose and aims ........................................................................................................................................ 1. Guideline for monitoring marine vegetation .............................................................................. 2. Guideline for monitoring coralligenous and other calcareous bioconstructions ....................... 3. Guideline for monitoring dark habitats ...................................................................................... UNEP/MED WG.474/3 Page 1 General premise The Contracting Parties to the Barcelona Convention have adopted the Ecosystem Approach (EcAp) in 2008 with the Decision IG. 17/6, aimed at reaching “A healthy Mediterranean with marine and coastal ecosystems that are productive and biologically diverse for the benefit of present and future generations” (UNEP/MAP, 2008). This process (EcAp) aims to achieve the Good Environmental Status (GES) through informed management decisions, based on integrated quantitative assessment and monitoring of the marine and coastal environment of the Mediterranean, in order to manage human activities sustainably. In 2016, during the 19th Meeting of the Contracting Parties to the Barcelona Convention (COP19, Athens, Greece, 9-12 February 2016), an Integrated Monitoring and Assessment Programme and related Assessment Criteria (IMAP) has also been adopted by the Mediterranean region. The resulting document describes the strategy, objectives and products that the Contracting Parties have to deliver over the second period of the implementation of the EcAp (2016-2021) in the framework of the Mediterranean Action Plan (UNEP/MAP, 2008). The main goal of IMAP is to build and implement a regional integrated monitoring system gathering reliable quantitative and updated data on the status of marine and coastal Mediterranean environment. A list of agreed 27 Common Indicators (CIs), articulated on 11 Ecological Objectives (EO) in synergy with the European Union’s Marine Strategy Framework Directive (2008/56/EC), and GES targets of the IMAP have been set in the Decision IG.22/7. In the context of the IMAP, a Common Indicator is defined as “an indicator that summarizes data into a simple, standardised, and communicable figure and is ideally applicable in the whole Mediterranean basin, or at least on the level of sub-regions, and is monitored by all Contracting Parties. A common indicator is able to give an indication of the degree of threat or change in the marine ecosystem and can deliver valuable information to decision makers”. During the initial phase of the IMAP implementation (2016-2019), the Contracting parties to the Barcelona Convention were asked to update the existing national monitoring and assessment programmes in order to provide all the data needed to assess whether the GES defined through the EcAp process has been achieved or maintained. Monitoring programmes at the national level are shared to create a compatible, shared Mediterranean pool of data, usable by each Contracting Party to product common indicator assessment reports in an integrated manner, which ensures comparability across the Mediterranean region. Among the five EcAp Common Indicators related to “biodiversity” (EO1) fixed by IMAP, two are related to habitats in the Barcelona Convention Decision IG.22/7 (UNEP/MAP, 2008), namely: • Common Indicator 1: Habitat distributional range, to also consider habitat extent as a relevant attribute • Common Indicator 2: Condition of the habitat’s typical species and communities. Regarding the assessment of the EO1 “biodiversity”, a quantitative definition of GES is difficult, considering the variety of conceptual facets existing around the term “biodiversity” (e.g., genetic diversity, species diversity, and habitat diversity). Thus, the GES boundaries are here defined as “the acceptable deviation from a reference state, which reflects conditions largely free from anthropogenic pressures”. Purpose and aims The purpose of this document is to elucidate the guidelines for monitoring marine benthic habitats in Mediterranean following common and standardised monitoring programmes, to address the two CIs that specifically relate to habitats, and specifically to those habitats selected by the Parties, i.e. marine vegetation, coralligenous and other calcareous bioconstructions, dark habitats. UNEP/MED WG.474/3 Page 2 Common Indicator 1: Habitat distributional range, to also consider habitat extent as a relevant attribute. This indicator is aimed at providing information about the geographical area in which the benthic habitat occurs. It reflects the distributional range of benthic habitats that are present on Mediterranean bottoms. The main outputs of the monitoring for this indicator will be maps with the habitat presence and distributional range. Availability of updated and complete maps will allow detecting any important change in the habitat distributional patterns to understand their evolution over time, and measuring their distance from the original, reference status (i.e., the baseline). Common Indicator 2: Condition of the habitat’s typical species and communities. This indicator is aimed at providing information about the ecological status of the benthic habitat. Assessments should be focused in collecting data on the status of habitats using typical/target species as indicators and/or considering the community composition. Thanks to this indicator any important change in the status of the habitat can be detected, and again availability of long-term data series will allow understanding the trajectories of change experienced by those habitats through time. The main aim of these guidelines is to provide guidance to managers and decision makers (e.g., environmental authority representatives, researchers, Marine Protected Area - MPA representatives) on field methodologies for long-term monitoring of marine benthic habitats