European Lifestyles and the Marine Environment (ELME)

Background

Marine ecosystems are vital providers of resources and services to humanity, yet in many areas we continue to over exploit those environments that support us. Bringing marine ecosystems into policies for sustainable development requires better information on the causal chains between human pressures and the changing state of the systems. The impacts of human activities such as fishing, pollution and coastal development in the marine environment have been monitored. However, few studies consider causality, especially on the scale required for managing ecosystems. This is particularly important at a time when the European Community is expanding, re-examining its agricultural and chemical policies, implementing a new fisheries policy and exploring new ways to protect marine systems.

Objectives

Through improved understanding of the relationship between European lifestyles and the state of marine ecosystems, ELME will model the consequences of alternative scenarios for human development in post-accession Europe on the marine environment.

It aims to provide:

• a comparable assessment of the consequences of current human lifestyles on Europe’s regional seas (the Baltic, North Sea, Mediterranean and the Black Sea)
• a region-by-region predictive model of each of the key problems during different European development scenarios
• an integrated vision of the future state of Europe’s seas following the application of alternative policy options.

Policy development

• ELME will support the new integrated EC Strategy to Protect and Conserve the Marine Environment
• provide a framework for incorporating the marine environment into a community-wide policy of sustainable development.
• strengthen the scientific basis of the ecosystem approach itself and the way this is translated into Community policies.
• make a significant contribution towards the creation of a ‘knowledge-based society’ in Europe

Cefas contribution

Cefas is responsible for coordinating the chemical pollution aspects of the project at different European regional seas, to:

• assess the current chemical pollution problems and identify the principal social/economic causes
• review and assess the causality pathways and processes from the principal drivers and pressures giving rise to state responses in the marine environment.
• develop conceptual causality models to describe case studies on chemical pollution and allow creation of scenarios.
• undertake scenario testing to examine the effectiveness of applying various assessments and monitoring approaches to manage the effects of hazardous substances in the marine environment. 

Partners

This project involves 28 partners from 14 different countries.