MAMA-Towards a new paradigm for ocean monitoring in the Mediterranean

Sustainable development requires the intelligent management of the marine environment, to protect the marine ecosystem, minimise the impacts of climate change and anthropogenic influences, and provide benefits for a wide range of users. Routine ocean monitoring and forecasting based on sound science, long term and adaptive monitoring, and co-operation between nations, is the main tool for such a management. The assets and needs of all countries have to be identified, as well as the constraints impeding data exchange and marine observations in the EEZs. The challenge is to build a monitoring system based on up-to-date science and technology, and adapted to the specificity of the basin for the benefit of different users in all Mediterranean countries. It is necessary to involve all riparian countries in the process of building the Mediterranean monitoring system. A strengthened and dedicated link between the scientific community and the public authorities is moreover necessary to provide a sound scientific background for policy decisions based on environmental monitoring. Building on these concepts the Mediterranean network to Assess and upgrade the Monitoring and forecasting Activity in the region (MAMA), funded under the EESD Programme of the 5th FP, and involving partners from all the Mediterranean countries, aims to establish the multi-national network that will prepare the institutional linkages and regional platform for such an integrated and sustained monitoring system in the region. The project builds on the trans-national pooling of scientific and technological resources and provides a concerted basin-scale effort towards the planning and design of the initial ocean observing system in the Mediterranean. The system-wide approach of MAMA is expected to trigger an enhanced motivation on the relevance of systematic marine observations for the sustainable and shared use of the marine resources of the Mediterranean Sea. These catalytic ingredients constitute the thrust of MAMA and an enabling asset to the future projection into long-term commitments at governmental level. © 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.