Description
Project is meant to fill several gaps in implementation of EU Habitat and Bird Directives in Estonia. Specifically project will deal with development of criteria for defining the favourable conservation status and of marine habitat types, development and testing of the monitoring and assessment methods for different habitat types, perform inventories of habitats in potentially suitable areas of EEZ and Natura 2000 sites so far not covered by habitat invetories, perform one series of monitoring to define the status and quality of marine habitat types in different areas of Estonian territorial waters and EEZ, perform detailed inventory of waterbirds in Estonian EEZ, develop and test the monitoring method for ringed seals. Stakeholders to benefit are government and local agencies, general public and scientific community. Partnership is composed of organisations most competent in the subjects of monitoring and assessment of marine nature values in Estonia. The donor partner brings wider international perspective and experiences to the issues of conservation and management of marine nature values and contributes with specific skills and knowledge.
Summary of project results
The general aim of the project was to contribute to the establishment of favourable conservation status of marine nature values in Estonian territorial waters and EEZ in the NE Baltic Sea. Specifically project dealt with development of criteria for defining the favourable conservation status and of marine habitat types, development and testing of the monitoring and assessment methods for different habitat types, inventories of habitats in potentially suitable areas of EEZ and Natura 2000 sites so far not covered by habitat inventories, performed one series of monitoring to define the status and quality of marine habitat types in different areas of Estonian territorial waters and EEZ, performed detailed inventory of waterbirds in Estonian EEZ and developed and tested new monitoring method for ringed seals. All planned outcomes were reached and delivered in full extent: 1. Report on establishment of criteria for favourable conservation status of Annex I Marine habitat types in Estonian coastal sea. 2. Map of distribution of HD Annex I marine habitat types and EUNIS level 3 habitat complexes in Estonian EEZ. 3. Report on results of inventories of marine habitat types in areas of EEZ where modelling predicted occurrence of those habitat types with detailed map and biological and physical data. 4. Report on results of inventories of marine habitat types in Natura 2000 areas previously not covered by inventories with detailed map and biological and physical data. 5. Report on distribution of non nesting waterbirds in territorial sea and results of inventories in pilot areas in EEZ. 6. Distribution maps of waterbirds in territorial sea and pilot areas in EEZ. 7. Methodological guidelines and monitoring programme for marine birds. 8. Report on monitoring methodology for establishing conservation status of marine habitat types in Estonia sea areas. 9. Report on conservation status of marine habitat types of Annex I of HD in larger basins of Estonian coastal sea and EEZ – Gulf of Finland, Gulf of Riga, Baltic Proper and West Estonian Archipelago Sea. 10. Report on new, alternative methodology for monitoring of the ringed seals in the Estonian marine areas. Project results had a very large impact on national activities concerned conservation of marine habitats, birds and seal populations. Developed methodologies as well as collected baseline data filled large gap in previous knowledge and capacity to perform marine nature conservation.
Summary of bilateral results
GRID-Arendal provided international experience and expertise in marine habitat mapping and assessment to the NEMA project. GRID-Arendal delivered a review of international approaches to the assessment of the quality and status of marine habitats, drawing on approaches from Australia, the USA and Europe. GRID-Arendal worked closely with the Estonian Marine Institute to develop maps of the marine habitats using a range of approaches. Donor partner delivered a habitat classification map based on multivariate statistical analysis of available biophysical data within the Estonian EEZ that included the Habitat Directive Annex I habitats plus categories identified in the European Nature Information System (EUNIS) habitat classification system. GRID-Arendal worked with Estonian partner organisations to identify and collate the relevant biophysical data sets. For the task on developing the monitoring programme, GRID-Arendal made itself available to participate in meetings and discussions on how to apply the habitat map to methods for monitoring and reporting habitat condition and trend. Participation of GRID-Arendal in the project strenghtened the partnership with exellent international experience in the topic and provided good possibilities for further collaboration. Introducing wide international experience in the planning and management of marine nature values and spatial data had definitely have positive effect on the further thematic activities in Estonia. The partnership has enabled a sharing of experience between GRID-Arendal and the Estonian Marine Institute. This has enabled the project outcomes and outputs to be achieved to a high standard and added value that would not have been possible without the partnership. The combined experience ofGRID-Arendal and the Estonian Marine Institute has enabled a combination of approaches to be investigated in developing marine habitat maps that would not have been posible without this partnership. The partnership was able to showcase its effectiveness at the final NEMA seminar in Tallinn in April 2016. This showcased the project results to the relevant Estonian government agencies. This will allow the results of the project to be more widely understood and applied in government decisionmaking. Results of the cooperation will be presented to the wider International public through participation in International conferences and scientific publications.