Articles

As the IUCN World Conservation Congress opens, four experts enlighten us on biodiversity, and on the major role played by its preservation in maintaining the equilibrium of our planet.

The protection of the ocean – climate – biodiversity nexus is at the core of the challenges that will be facing us in the future. 

Biodiversity is the basis of a whole system of food production worldwide and is our sole response for the mitigation of climate change.

Marine biodiversity, even more poorly known, plays a particularly important role in these issues, and we know today that its preservation is at the heart of all potential solutions.

As the IUCN World Conservation Congress opens, four experts provide enlightenment in the new number of the Institute’s Newsletter: 

Françoise Gaill, Emeritus Director of Research CNRS, Vice-Chair of the Ocean and Climate Platform. 

Gilles Boeuf, Chair of the Scientific Council of the Agence Française pour la Biodiversité (AFB).

Colomban de Vargas, Director of Research CNRS at the Roscoff marine biology station, Coordinator of the Tara Oceans Expedition and the OCEANOMICS Project, Director of the CNRS unit Tara Oceans GO-SEE.

Nardo Vicente, Emeritus Professor of marine biology, Aix-Marseille University (IMBE), Scientific Counsellor of the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard.

It’s yours to read and enjoy !

Download the Newsletter

The Institute will be taking part in the congress, notably with speeches by Patricia Ricard, the Institute’s President, during conferences and round tables. While some are reserved for congress participants, others are open to the general public.

Saturday 4 September and throughout the congress

Patricia Ricard will be speaking at the Forum, and will present an e-poster on the topic : ‘Suppose Nature gave us lessons for the future ? Bouillabaisse 4.0’. Reserved for congress participants, accessible online.

12.00-12.30

Speech by Patricia Ricard at Pavillon France, with Mr Payan, Mayor of Marseille, on the topic : ‘Marseille, carbon neutral city by 2030’. Open to the general public.

Sunday 5 September

11.30-12.30

Speech by Patricia Ricard, in the form of a pitch for solutions, on the theme : ‘An Ocean of solutions for the Climate and Biodiversity’, Ocean and Climate Platform, at Pavillon France. Open to the General Public.

Monday 6 September

8.30 – 9.30

Patricia Ricard will take part in the meeting of the Sea’Ties partners, at Mx at the Docks. A programme led by the Ocean and Climate Platform to tackle coastal erosion in the context of climate change.

Link to the Sea’Ties programme

14.30 – 15.30

Speech by Patricia Ricard on the Océan de Synchronicity stage, on the theme ‘Valorisation of marine resources: how to valorise collected marine waste’. EGN, open to the general public.

14.00

Patricia Ricard will speak during the official presentation of the fresco on biomimicry exhibited in the Generation Nature Areas. Open to the general public.

Link to the fresco gallery

Tuesday 7 September

-10.30 to 11.00

Patricia Ricard will speak at the round table devoted to the Blue Plan : ‘Aquaculture and Biodiversity in the Mediterranean’. At Pavillon France, open to the general public with registration.

-15.45-16.30

Patricia Ricard will speak at the round table on “Issues related to biodiversity and the circular economy’, organised at Pavillon France with CITEO, designated since November 2020 as a Mission Corporation.  The President of the Institute is a member of the Mission Board. Open to the general public, Stand Citeo (A48) – Exposition area – Hall 3.

Thursday 9 September

Patricia Ricard, with Dr Robert Bunet, Doirector of Research, and Dr Sylvain Couvray, will take part in a visit to the Calanque de Podestat, in partnership with EDF. A research programme carried out at the Institute since 2012 focused on a study of the evolution of the biodiversity of this protected area, within the Calanques National Park. The outing is reserved for congress participants. 

Research Programme Podestat

Saturday 11 September

As a side event of the congress, the GPES, the oldest diving club still active, will celebrate its 80th anniversary at La Ciotat. After a morning focused on the history of diving, Patricia Ricard, President of the Institute, will speak at 14.00 on the subject of future developments.

Link to the day’s programme

Information provided subject to alterations and restricted access. The full programme of scheduled speeches and the registration formalities for events at Pavillon France are available at the Congress website.

On the occasion of the IUCN World Conservation Congress, the French railway company SNCF Gares & Connexions presents the exhibition 1OCEAN, a major photographic testimony to the ocean. An adventure which takes us over the coming ten years to all the seas in the world to carry a clear message : without frontiers, the ocean is unique and its preservation is the business of every one of us. A project supported by the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard.

The images exhibited at Marseille on the esplanade of Saint-Charles station this time focus on French territorial waters, from mainland France to Overseas France. The extent of France’s maritime territory, which covers 8% of the world’s oceans, gives us, with regard to the preservation of biodiversity, an additional responsibility. 10% of the coral reefs, for example, are under French jurisdiction.

At the beginning of the United Nations Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, coordinated by COI-UNESCO, this photographic project aims to combine exploration and sharing. It highlights the central role of knowledge and seeks to deploy the power of the image to change people’s behaviour, in phase with Ocean Literacy. Through the emotive force of photography, the images invite us to discover the fragile beauty of the world Ocean, to become aware of the threats that increasingly weigh upon the ecosystems. “We have a decade to change things” Alexis Rosenfeld concludes, “and we all have a role to play”.

After being exhibited in March 2021 at the Gare de Lyon and the Gare du Nord stations in Paris, Alexis Rosenfeld’s photographs will also be on show in a few weeks at the Haussmann Saint-Lazare and Magenta stations in Paris.

Images Alexis Rosenfeld. Opening page, pilot whales in the Mediterranean.

To find out more :

@Alexis.rosenfeld

@AlexisRosenfeld

1 OCEAN website

UNESCO website

Gares et Connexions website

This time it’s for real ! The IUCN World Conservation Congress will be opening next week.  With virtual forums and face-to-face meetings with experts, it aims to provide a basis for “reconstruction based on nature, for the climate and for biodiversity post-2020”. It will also enable the general public to better understand the issues of today, to find out about a plethora of initiatives to preserve the planet, and to take action ourselves. The Institute will be represented at the Congress.

From 3rd to 11th September, the IUCN Congress, repeatedly postponed because of the health crisis, will bring together NGOs, governments, members of civil society, scientists and companies to review the actions in progress and upcoming aimed at helping us to meet the challenges facing the environment, related to the conservation of biodiversity. The Congress is also a way-stage before the conferences on biodiversity and the climate which are due to be held at Kunming (COP 15 on biodiversity) and Glasgow (COP 26 on the climate) in the coming months. Seven working themes have been chosen: landscapes ; freshwater ; oceans ; climate change ; rights and governance ; economic and financial systems ; knowledge, innovation and technology.

The event will be organised around several focal points : a Forum, presented as a market for new ideas, research and policies related to the conservation of biodiversity ;  the  members assembly of IUCN, which includes more than 1 400 organisations which are expected on the occasion of the Congress to announce major decisions concerning world conservation policies for the coming decade : and finally areas open to the general public.

Areas open to the general public to transform every visitor into a committed actor

This latest congress doesn’t only concern the experts and the deciders. Free of charge and without any registration formalities, the Nature Generation Areas are intended for the first time in the congress’ history to welcome the general public: conceived as a “friendly and lively biodiversity village”, these areas should help visitors to better understand the issues related to biodiversity, and also to take on board the right everyday reflexes to contribute to its preservation. The Nature Generation Areas are intended to be both fun and instructive, with workshops, experiments, exhibitions and meetings with the actors involved in protecting biodiversity.

It’s an initiative directly inspired by the Climate Generation Areas which were devised in 2015 during COP21 on the climate in Paris. For example, the programme features: ‘Nature watch, what is the purpose of the data from citizen science ?’, ‘Wild immersion, immersion in virtual reality’, and  ‘Workshop on Mediterranean cetaceans”. 

A second area, in addition to the first, will also welcome the general public, from 10 am to 5.30 pm, from 4th to 11 September : in Pavillon France, at the entrance to Parc Chanot, members of IUCN and also companies and universities will have stands presenting their research and the solutions they propose. There are too 13 000 m² of outside exhibition areas, open to all.

Patricia Ricard, President of the Institute, will be a speaker on Sunday 5th September at 11.30 in Pavillon France, during a conference entitled  “An ocean of solutions for the climate and for biodiversity”.  She will also be taking part on September 7th in a round table focused on biodiversity issues and the circular economy. The Institute’s full programme will be made available shortly.

Nature Generation Areas Programme

Congress website

The health regulations in force of course apply for this event.

In the course of surveys carried out at the end of May 2021 in the Diana, Urbinu and Balistra lagoons, a team of scientists from the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard were able to draw up a first assessment of the survival status of the fan mussel, Pinna nobilis, a protected emblematic and endemic Mediterranean species. The results are promising.

Since 2016, the fan mussel P. nobilis has been victim to an epizootic (parasitosis linked to a Haplosporidium), widespread throughout the Mediterranean basin, causing massive mortality. The species has been protected at European level since 1992 (Directive 92/43/CEE), and has recently been recognised and classified as ‘in critical danger of extinction’ in the IUCN** red list of threatened species. But the fan mussel, on the brink of extinction, seems to have found refuge in certain coastal lagoons, notably in Corsica.

In Corsica the first cases of mortality were reported in 2017, in the Ajaccio area, and at the end of 2018 in the Scandula Natural Reserve, where all the known individuals were wiped out. Recently, certain populations unaffected by this parasite have been observed in Mediterranean lagoons. In the context of this epidemic, and with the aim of establishing a first assessment in what might constitute ‘refuges’, a survey was carried out from 24 to 28 May 2021 among fan mussel populations, some of them already previously monitored, in the Diana, Urbinu and Balistra lagoons.

In the Balistra lagoon, the survey confirmed the absence of live individuals in the known sector in the eastern part of the lagoon. No live fan mussel or recent recruitment of juveniles was observed. Only four dead individuals (earlier deaths) already reported by the association Corse Images Sous-marines in the spring of 2020 were found.

The observations carried out in the Urbinu lagoon (with permission and logistical support provided by the Conservatoire du Littoral) enabled identification along the lido to the south of the grau (currently closed) of 2 stands of old fan mussels, all dead for several years. A single living adult individual (with a total height of about 40 cm) was observed to the north of the grau. In this sector, the vast and dense Cymodocea meadow was partly covered by a thick carpet of filamentous algae of the genus Cladophora, which made it difficult to detect any possible juvenile fan mussel individuals in the meadow underneath. A further visit to the site in the autumn or earlier in the season (when the algae are absent) would make it possible to make more precise observations. Similarly, new surveys will be carried out in the sectors further away from the grau in order to provide a more complete survey of this lagoon which has very high potential as a refuge for the fan mussel.

In the Diana lagoon, the presence of populations of the fan mussel has been known since 1990 thanks in particular to the work of Béatrice de Gaulejac and Nardo Vicente. In 2019, during a survey by researchers from the IOPR, the density observed at a single site was always high (around 8 fan mussels/100m²). The new surveys carried out at several stations (including those of 2019) provide a basis for reassessing the situation in this lagoon.

With the cooperation and technical support of M. Pantalacci and his staff (SARL Etang de Diana), the IOPR team were able to carry out the following actions:

Transects (area observed 50 m length x 2m width x 2) performed at a first station enabled observation of 29 live individuals (juveniles and sub-adults), including 9 tagged individuals, and a density estimated at 5 individuals/100m².

At a second station, 2 additional transects were performed on a population of old dead fan mussels (earlier deaths), and a larval capture device was installed in the south of the lagoon.

The team also went back to the station studied in 2019, where a second larval capture device was installed, and where 8 live individuals were tagged, among a fairly dense population of live juveniles and sub-adults (up to 3 individuals/m² at each place). Millimetre-scale sampling of the mantel was carried out on 10 individuals using biopsy pincers (a technique that causes no harm to the individuals sampled). These samples will serve to perform genetic studies for comparison with other populations in the open sea or in other lagoons, and for the possible detection of the parasite. For this purpose, sediment samples were also taken to test for the possible presence of the parasite, using molecular biology techniques.

Finally, during a rapid survey to the north of the shellfish farm situated on the west bank a residual stand of sixty or so old fan mussels was observed (all dead for several years), settled in a dense Cymodocea nodosa meadow.

In conclusion, if the preliminary inventories carried out in the Urbinu and Balistra lagoons have for the moment proved inconclusive as concerns the live populations and the recent recruitment of young individuals (but which nonetheless merit confirmation over the whole of these two lagoons), the number of individuals in good health and aged about 2 years recorded in the Diana lagoon shows that recent recruitment has occurred. These observations offer new hope given that these lagoons present a strong potential in terms of pockets of resistance and renewal of the species, and as a site that is propitious for the future reintroduction of juveniles resulting from larval capture.

*Nardo Vicente, Emeritus Professor of Marine Biology at IMBE, Aix-Marseille university, and Scientific Counsellor, IOPR; Robert Bunet, researcher and Scientific Director, IOPR, and Mathieu Foulquié, research engineer in ecology and photographer specialising in the marine environment.

** Since they concern a protected species, the activities performed in the course of this survey were subject to Arrêté Préfectoral n° 2B-2020-12-21-008.

To find out more :

Simide R., S. Couvray, N. Vicente, 2019. Présence de Pinna nobilis (L. 1758) dans l’étang littoral de Diana (Corse). marinelife-revue.fr

de Gauléjac B., M. Roux, C. Poizat, N. Vicente, 2005. Cadre sédimentaire et méïofaunal de Pinna nobilis Linné, 1758, de l’étang de Diana, Corse, France. Mar. Life, 15 (1-2) : 51-61.

Nardo Vicente, 2020. La grande nacre de Méditerranée : Pinna nobilis, un coquillage bivalve plein de noblesse. Presses de l’Université de Provence, 152 p.

Bunet R., Prévot J.M., Vicente N.,  Garcia-March J.,  Martinović R., Medialdea J., Joksimovic D., Bonnefont J.L., & Coupé S., 2021. First insight into the whole genome shotgun sequence of the endangered noble pen shell Pinna nobilis : a giant bivalve undergoing a mass mortality event. Journal of Molluscan Studies. 87. 10.1093/mollus/eyaa041.

Contact :

Nardo Vicente : nardo.vicente@sfr.fr

Robert Bunet : robert.bunet@institut-paul-ricard.org

The eighth edition of the event organised every year by the PIM Initiative (Preserving Small Mediterranean Islands Initiative), the Conservatoire du Littoral (French coastal protection agency), SMILO (Small Islands Organisation) and GLISPA (Global Island Partnership) will be held from 18th to 23rd May. The aim is to increase awareness on issues related to the preservation of the small islands in the Mediterranean.

The theme of this year’s meeting, “Let’s take care of our islands”, is still in phase with the sustainable development perspective adopted from the outset. After highlighting ‘Island biodiversity’ during the first meeting in 2014, all the themes have been focused on promoting nature-based solutions, and management systems dedicated to the protection of small island territories.

The themes chosen each year help managers to imagine diverse ways to raise awareness: outings to natural sites, talks, photo exhibitions, technical workshops, waste clean-up operations, immersion of artificial reefs, naturalist surveys, visits to island wetlands, and more. And while the main part of the event is from 18th to 23rd May, it actually continues until July.

This year, a video competition has also been organised in the run-up to the event: the goal is to present in 120 seconds the ‘best practices’ deployed to protect our islands. The video clips will be posted on the Celebrate Islands Facebook page from 18th May, and the winner will receive funding of 3 000 euros to finance a micro-project.

The PIM Initiative, for the promotion and management of Mediterranean islands

Celebrate Islands is a direct spin-off from the PIM Initiative, a programme launched in 2005 by the French coastal protection agency, the Conservatoire du Littoral. In 2017, it became an independent association, an international NGO “for promotion and assistance in the management of Mediterranean insular areas”. It is not simply a matter of protecting purely and simply the natural environment. The aim of the Initiative is also to pool the competencies and the means to “maintain or restore the equilibrium between human dynamics and natural environments on the islands”. There is of course a focus on sustainable development, we must preserve these unique environments, but also develop a living and lasting local economy, whether it is based on tourism, fisheries, agriculture or industry. Not forgetting the necessity to “preserve and valorise the uniqueness of the natural and cultural island heritage”, on the 15 000 islands and islets to be found in the Mediterranean.

The aim is to undertake practical actions in the field, based on a network of “experts from different disciplines, managers of natural areas, coastguards, public bodies and NGOs throughout the Mediterranean region, who compare experiences and exchange notes and make their expertise available to ensure better managed and better protected island areas”.

Since the launch of the PIM Initiative, the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard has also taken part in several field missions in France and abroad. 

Link to the PIM Initiative website 

Link to the Celebrate Islands Facebook page

The framework of the mission is the European research program MaCoBioS. The overall objective of this program is to ensure effective management and conservation strategies for European marine coastal ecosystems to face climate change and biodiversity loss.

Job offer post-doc IOPR

Mainly occurring in the western tropical Atlantic, from the coasts of Africa to the Canaries, the species reached the Mediterranean through the Strait of Gibraltar and settled in the warm waters of southern Spain. For a long time, it remained confined to that area. But for the past ten years, there have been more and more sightings, in Corsica, on the French mainland coasts and in the eastern Mediterranean basin.

Smaller than the fan mussel, and broader, with a brownish colour and recognisable in adulthood by the radial ribs on its shell, the spiny fan-mussel, Pinna rudis, has long been “abundant on the Spanish coasts“, explains Prof. Nardo Vicente, the Institute’s scientific counsellor, “where it is encountered with P. nobilis, constituting intermingled populations“. On the French coasts, it only began to make an appearance in the late 1990s, when a few individuals were sighted in the Scandola marine reserve and nearby. 

Larvae carried by the currents

“The presence of numbers of Pinna rudis on the Spanish coasts, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the mouth of the Ebro” Prof. Vincent continues, “suggests that the species arrived from the Atlantic coasts in the form of larvae carried by the surface current flowing into the Mediterranean through the strait”. One branch of this current flows up the Spanish coast and certain of these larvae even managed to progress as far as the Costa Brava, where some of the juveniles were caught at Cadaquès. A second branch of the current flows along the Algerian coast, where Pinna rudis has also been found. Another flows towards the west coasts of Sardinia and Corsica, which no doubt explains its arrival in the Scandola reserve. “But this input“, explains Nardo Vicente, “must entail a considerable loss of larvae, which would explain the sporadic occurrence of this species.  It would be worth undertaking a more detailed study of the local current patterns”.

Populations that are still scattered

The spiny fan-mussels that have been sighted are generally found on the coralligenous bottoms, down to around forty metres depth, but some also settle at shallow depths on the edges of the Posidonia oceanica meadows, or on rocky shallow bottoms.  But for the time being, even if sightings are on the increase along our coasts, they remain occasional and always scattered. For large populations of the spiny fan-mussel to really settle on our coasts, the drift of the larvae would not be enough. It would be necessary for the species to reproduce here, “as was the case for P. nobilis, before the outbreak of the epizootic, or for a greater number of larvae to arrive, drifting with the currents, and settle in favourable zones. On the Costa Brava (Tort et al. 1995, Vicente, 1995), larval capture of the two species was carried out, and the grow-out of young recruits achieved in baskets suspended in the open sea.

A species unaffected by the current epizootic

“The populations of Pinna nobilis”, recalls Nardo Vicente, “have been decimated since autumn 2016, along the whole of the Mediterranean coasts, by a specific parasite Haplosporidium pinnae, which does not seem to have any effect Pinna rudis (Vazquez-Luis et al. 2017).” It might therefore be imagined that, with climate change and the warming of the water, which seem to favour the flourishing of Pinna rudis, the species might settle little by little on our coasts, and end up reaching the whole of the Mediterranean.

It would appear too, even if there has not yet been enough observation and experimentation to affirm it with any certainty, that there exist hybrids between the two species, which would also prove resistant to the devastating parasite. Researchers now plan to pursue their investigations along these lines, and in particular to carry out new genetic analyses, after a first analysis of the sequencing of the genome of Pinna nobilis achieved under the direction of Dr Bunet, Director of Research at the Institute (Bunet et al. 2020).

Nardo Vicente, Présence de Pinna rudis (Linné,1758) sur les côtes méditerranéennes françaises.

 Read the whole article (in French) on the Marine Life website

At the end of 2020, more than 600 researchers, working together in the framework of independent network of Mediterranean experts on environmental and climatic change (MedECC), published a report dedicated to scientific knowledge on the Mediterranean area. The region, already severely impacted, is going to have to deal with a range of challenges.

The rise in temperature in the Mediterranean basin has already reached 1.5° C for a worldwide mean average of 1.1 °C; the region features today among the world climate change hotspots because of its vulnerability to a spectrum of accumulated risks. The goal of the network, in addition to  pooling all the available data, is to generate synergy between all the fields of competence involved, at Mediterranean region scale, to make available to deciders the essential information and ways forward, taking into account the upcoming issues.

Populations impacted by the rise in sea level

Today, more than 500 million people are living in the Mediterranean area, a number that will continue to increase in the coming decades. Most of the population live near the coast, and are at risk of being quickly impacted by the rise in sea level. Over the past century, it has risen almost 20 cm, as has the global ocean, with an rate of increase accelerating by 6 centimetres over the past 20 years !  Here too, despite the forecasts realised, it is impossible to provide definite figures, but it is perfectly envisageable that the phenomenon is speeding up. Many Mediterranean cities, such as Marseille, are likely to be directly impacted.  Rural areas and farmland will be too, with the salination of the soil, particularly severe in delta areas. The experts reckon that the risks of coastal flooding, between now and  2100, will probably increase two-fold, with a mean sea level rise that could be more than a metre according to the most pessimistic scenario.  To that must be added coastal erosion, at a rate estimated at 13% over the same period. 

A probable decline in the water resource 

Water resources, because of the temperature increase, added to the worldwide reduction in precipitation, will decline. And even though today it is impossible to estimate with precision by how much, the expert group places it at between 10 and 30% over the next twenty years or so. But there is already an imbalance: three quarters of the water resources are used in the north of the basin, whereas three quarters of the population live in the southern half ! Solutions will have to be sought, whether through the irrigation of farmland or wastewater management, in order to meet the needs of all. All the more so because the productivity of the farmland is on the decline with the temperature rise. Corn production, for instance, would fall by 7.5% per degree of warming. Finally, the rapid increase in what we call ‘heat waves’, in frequency and intensity, will have a human health and social impact which will have to be reckoned with.

Destructive climatic episodes

The worldwide decline in precipitation will moreover be matched, even if that may seem paradoxical, by a sharp increase in destructive episodes, as has become apparent for the past ten years or so: intensive rainfall,  concentrated both in duration and localisation, causes unprecedented flooding, with a whole procession of material damage but also, more and more often, loss of human life. These ‘Mediterranean episodes’, which generally occur in the Autumn, are related to stormy phenomena when the outer atmosphere cools while the  surface waters of the sea remain warm. They are likely in the future to increase in number and intensity, inasmuch as the water temperature is constantly rising and does not drop rapidly at the end of the summer, as was still the case a couple of decades ago.

Alteration of the biodiversity

In 25 years, the Mediterranean sea has warmed up by 1°C, and this increase in temperature could reach 2.5°C over the coming century.  By offering conditions favourable for the arrival of so-called tropical species, there is a risk that in due course, it will alter our biodiversity.  The ecosystems have always undergone external influences, and an alteration of the biodiversity dos not necessarily signify depletion. But the phenomenon is speeding up and does not always leave nature time to adapt: when an invasive species settles, if it does so too quickly, it will take the place of a traditional local species. This is what might happen, for example, with the salema porgy, in direct competition with the rabbitfish, another herbivore and more and more frequent.  This too rapid pattern of change might endanger our ecosystems by destabilising them.

The acidification of the water

The absorption of atmospheric CO2, as elsewhere, limits the warming of the atmosphere, but disturbs the chemistry of the water and causes its acidification.  It is estimated in the north-western Mediterranean that this acidity has increased by 10% in 25 years. At the current rate of emissions, it might increase by a further 30% by 2050, which would jeopardise numerous species.

Apart from the capacity for adaptation and resilience of our Mediterranean basin, the report concludes in the absolute necessity of drastically cutting greenhouse gas emissions in the region, the only way to avoid a climate disaster, which would of necessity be a socio-economic disaster too.

Link for MedECC website

Link to download the report

#mediterranean #climate #biodiversity #medecc

Picture P. Lelong, Les Embiez island.

The Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development has just started. What is the aim of this international initiative, launched by the United Nations, and how will it contribute to preserving the Ocean, a common good of humanity?

One thing is clear: the Ocean is at the core of the global environment. 

It has been a long road, but today the major role of the Ocean in the climate machine is no longer disputed. It absorbs almost a third of the CO2 produced by humanity and undeniably mitigates the impact of climate warming. Its good state of health is of concern to all of us today, and it is faced with a range of threats: overfishing, acidification, various forms of pollution, warming of the water. And while certain regulatory measures, such as the regulation of fishing stocks, the banning of certain pollutants or the establishment of protected areas can provide a partial solution, the development of the ocean sciences is essential.

Mobilisation around ocean research

This Decade should provide the means to increase the number of research programmes dedicated to the oceans, and also to encourage exchanges between researchers, research teams and the different disciplines which make up the ocean sciences, by creating a international framework for coordination and partnerships. It should also prioritize the environmental and socio-economic aspects to propose realisable applications to help the political deciders to make their decisions in full possession of all the necessary information. Finally, because for it to succeed, everyone should feel concerned, the Decade should also support the notion of Ocean Literacy.  This term implies knowledge of the Ocean which should make each of us more aware of its role.

Seeking funding

The aim of the Decade is also to diversify the sources of funding dedicated to ocean research. It is estimated that today the amount devoted to ocean research only represents, depending on the country, between 0.04% and 4 % of the total amount invested in research and development. But the investments needed, whether in technological means (the fleet of oceanographic research vessels, robots, satellite imagery systems) or in human resources (field surveys and laboratory work and data processing) are enormous.

Achieving SDG 14

The global increase in our knowledge of the Ocean should also enable us in due course to speed up the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 14 (SDG 14): “Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources”. Let us not forget that almost three billion people depend directly on the marine biodiversity to meet their needs. Most of these coastal populations are in developing countries which do not necessarily possess the financial resources to take the necessary preservation measures.

Decade of Ocean Science website

Photo: Sandrine Ruitton.

The voyage of exploration 1 OCEAN will take us during the next ten years to all the seas in the world to carry a clear message: with no frontiers, the ocean is unique and its preservation concerns us all. A project supported by the Institut océanographique Paul Ricard.

The adventure starts with 20 pictures by the underwater photographer Alexis Rosenfeld, the project leader. They are exhibited in very large format in the forecourts of the Paris stations Gare de Lyon and Gare du Nord until 30th April by the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceangraphic Commission and the railway company SNCF Gares & Connexions.

At the start of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, coordinated by the UNESCO-IOC, the aim of Alexis Rosenfeld’s photographic project is to combine exploration with sharing. It highlights the central role of knowledge and seeks to mobilise the power of the image to change behaviours, along the lines of the Ocean Literacy concept.

“Sharing knowledge”, insists Vladimir Ryabinin, Executive Secretary of UNESCO-IOC, “transmitting knowledge, spreading awareness of this wonderful world without frontiers, is among the key actions of the UNESCO Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission. 1 OCEAN will extend the outreach of UNESCO’s environmental concerns among deciders, scientists and the general public.“

1000 photographs for a decade

The pictures exhibited are not only the premise of a vast campaign of exploration. They take us to the Mediterranean but also to New Caledonia to discover the Coral Sea natural park, included on the UNESCO World Heritage list. They will be followed by others, which will reveal a thousand facets of the marine environment, from the living creatures that inhabit it to the scientific research undertaken to better understand them and to protect them. Through the emotions generated by photography, they will invite us to get to know the fragile beauty of the world Ocean, to be aware of the threats that increasingly loom over the ecosystems. “We have a decade to change things,” Alexis Rosenfeld, “and we all have a role to play”. 

The year 2021 promises to be a decisive one for the climate, for biodiversity and for the environment. It will be marked by several major international events: COP Climate, COP Biodiversity, the IUCN World Conservation Congress at Marseille.

With DONIA, a free application to download, you can choose anchorages with low impact on the ecosystems, in particular on the Posidonia oceanica seagrass meadows. 

Developed by Andromède Océanologie, in partnership with the Rhône-Méditerranée-Corse water board, this application aims to provide a tool to enhance both safety and eco-responsibility: the information it provides means that sailors can choose their anchorage according to the meteorological conditions and above all according to the characteristics of the seabed nearby. It enables them to anchor safe in the knowledge that they will not damage the most fragile ecosystems, in particular the Posidonia oceanica seagrass beds. This as we know is a protected species, but it is in constant decline at many sites. Since last year, its preservation has had the support of several decrees by the French coastal authority, the Préfecture Maritime, focused on controlling anchorages, in particular for larger vessels.

Preserving and sharing

The basic version, completely free of charge and available for smartphones and pads, provides access to accurate marine charts with a wealth of information added, such as diving sites, the nearest harbour, places of interest, fishing regulations in force, and more. The application also enables users to share useful information on possible dangers encountered at sea (obstacles, accidents, jellyfish, SOS alerts, etc.), or to share personal observations by posting pictures, for instance. 

There is too a Premium version, for a fee, for those who want to make use of additional services such as alerts for anchor dragging, entangling or collisions, or recording the route sailed, measuring distances or setting a new course.

Seagrass meadows: now more precious than ever

While the role of seagrass meadows as nurseries and priviledged habitats for numerous species is well known, they are too providers of oxygen and capable of storing carbon. And they are excellent stabilisers for the seabed, and the banks of dead leaves that reappear every winter on our beaches, far from being just rubbish, are a vital rampart against erosion by the waves. In a context of global change and the erosion of the coastline,  the seagrasses are more precious than ever.

Link to the site application website

In the middle of January, the 2021 Driver Conference brought together researchers and representatives of institutions, industry and design engineering firms to take stock of ten years of ecological restoration, and to think about the actions to undertake for tomorrow. The Institute plays a role in this process of cooperation through its research programme.

What are known as the coastal shallow bottoms have for decades been impacted by human activities, urbanisation, discharges and pollution and overfishing. Yet they are of major ecological interest, in particular as concerns the shallow bays and the seagrass meadows, real nurseries, that have been especially hard hit, for example by the construction of harbours.

For ten years, scientists have been trying to find solutions to recreate the lost ecological functions, for instance by devising habitats for juveniles in the harbours by installing biohuts developed by Ecocéan. And it works ! The species are more numerous, the number of juveniles is on the increase, their survival rate is higher.

Seagrass meadows to coralligenous bottoms

A little deeper down, the seagrass meadows that provide oxygen, that are protectors of the coastline and carbon sinks, as well as nurseries, are also in the front line. With the increase in pleasure boating, they too are in decline, even if the new measures regulating boat mooring introduced in 2020 should put a halt to their destruction. Trials of transplantation of seagrass beds have been carried out, for example at Monaco with Andromède Oceanologie, or those carried out by the Institute in the Brusc lagoon (see the SAR-LAB programme).

A bit deeper still, in what is known as the infralittoral zone, many sites have been degraded, in particular by discharges from sewage outfalls. The water quality has perceptibly improved in recent years, and it is today the approach using artificial reefs that is being widely explored. Here it is not a matter of nurseries, but rather of refuge habitats in barren areas.

Extending and sharing knowledge

The aim is really to extend our knowledge, to boost the research programmes and to pool the results. For example, proper standardised protocols must be developed, fully transposable from one site to another. They will provide the means to compare the various tools efficiently, to choose what works best, for example to assess the colonisation time for the different types of reef that are proposed. 

In the harbour nurseries, the way the juveniles pass into the natural population must be validated, probably by the use of transmitters fixed to the fishes, since now we have the means to tag individuals that measure barely ten centimetres.

The conclusions of the DRIVER conference firmly insisted on the need to diversify the solutions, to test them, even if it means giving up on some of them, as nature has been doing for millions of years ! Here again, we should take nature as an example and take inspiration from it.

Taking part in the ICO-Solutions initiative

This year, DRIVER has joined forces with a new initiative baptised ICO Solutions, for Islands, Coasts and Oceans (Iles, Côtes et Océans). The Rhône – Mediterranean – Corsica Water Agency, the Conservatoire du Littoral, the Aix-Marseille-Provence Metropolis Chamber of Commerce and Industry, under the high patronage of the Ministry of Ecological Transition, are jointly organising ICO Solutions to support and promote practicable solutions to tackle the major issues related to the preservation and sustainable development of islands, coasts and oceans. Several workshops and meetings will be held in the first semester of 2020 to encourage public sector organisations, companies, experts, researchers and associations to co-construct solutions. The results will be presented during the Journées des Engagements ICO (Days of Commitment) to be held at the Palais de la Bourse in Marseille in parallel with the IUCN World Congress, planned for autumn 2021.

Link to the SAR-LAB programme

 Link to the ICO-Solutions website (in french)

As we have been doing regularly since the beginning of the epizootic that has affected Pinna nobilis, Professor Nardo Vicente has provided an update on the future perspectives for the species, from pockets of resistance to hopes for larval development.

The news is bleak: at present, the only healthy populations in France are to be found in the lagoons, for instance the Etang de Thau, where recent studies* show that the fan mussels are in good health, or the Diana and Urbino lagoons in Corsica, and in certain coastal zones under the influence of the Rhone river waters. “In the open sea“, confirms Nardo Vicente, “only a few isolated individuals have been reported, mainly at Port-Cros where three fan mussels aged between 2 and 3 years were observed and tagged in September. This is also the case at Les Embiez, and at other sites where one or two are still found alive, in places where previously they were very abundant“. During a dive on Friday 13th November at Port-Cros, the news was more positive: a scientist from the MIO sighted eight living fan mussels. But there is no guarantee that these isolated fan mussels will in the medium term survive the parasite. 

Collecting samples to save the species

In France, and also in Spain, samples have been collected to try to isolate healthy individuals.  Some 200 fan mussels, collected in the Etang de Thau by the team from the CRIOBE (Centre de Recherches Insulaires et Observatoire de l’Environnement) at Perpignan, have recently been put out of harm’s way in the aquarium. José Rafael Garcia March, Director of the IMEDMAR institute at Calpe in Spain, a former student of Nardo Vicente, has also collected a certain number of individuals since the onset of the parasitosis. The primary aim is to conserve fan mussels in good health until the end of the parasitosis crisis, but more needs to be done. Firstly by achieving the reproduction of these individuals, a technique that has today been mastered (PhD thesis by Béatrice de Gauléjac under the supervision of Prof. Vicente in 1993), “but also“, explains Nardo Vicente, “by achieving the development of larvae; we succeeded in doing this in 2014, to the fixed larvae stage” (PhD thesis by Sergio Trigos carried out at the IOPR under the supervision of Prof. Vicente, presented in 2017 at the Universidad Catolica de Valencia).  The researchers at the   CRIOBE are currently carrying out similar experiments. 

The prospect of reimplantations

“If we can manage to obtain young individuals”, explains Nardo Vicente, “we then have to let them grow in controlled environment for at least a year before reintroducing them into the sea, as we have already been doing in the Institute’s laboratories since the end of the 1990s.  But the mortality rate among juveniles is very high“. The reimplantation of these juveniles, once the zootic is over, might be a solution to reconstitute the populations. That at least is one of the tracks evoked in particular by the IUCN, which has included the species on the red list of endangered species and has classified it as ‘in critical danger of extinction’.

Limited larval renewal

“For the time being“, Nardo Vicente reminds us, “the renewal of the larvae can only occur in the coastal lagoons and the Corsican lagoons (Diana, Urbino) where the populations have escaped the zootic and are stable. We are incidentally developing a programme for these lagoons with the support of the OEC (Office de l’Environnement de la Corse – Corsica Environmental Agency)”. And when the epizootic is over, it will no doubt be from these populations that we can envisage a dispersal into the open sea. We might also hope that residual populations may manage to develop a kind of resistance to the virus. But for the moment there is no basis for trying to guess at a time frame.

Nardo VICENTE- La Grande nacre de Méditerranée Pinna nobilis. Un coquillage bivalve plein de noblesse. Sciences Technologies Santé. Ed.Presses Universitaires de Provence (2020).

*Inventaire et état de santé des populations de Pinna nobilis (L.1758) dans l’étang de Thau (Hérault, France), 2020. Mathieu Foulquié, Renaud Dupuy de la Grandrive, Nicolas Dalias and Nardo Vicente.

Read the full article (in French) on the site Marine Life website.

Citeo has become a Société à Mission’  (public benefit entreprise) and Patricia Ricard has been appointed a member of its Comité de Mission (mission committee), along with three other expert personalities. This label has been attributed to the company for its commitment to the preservation of the planet and its resources, for the public benefit.

We all know Citeo without being aware of it: when we sort our rubbish, it’s Citeo that does the recycling ! Set up by companies in the consumer packaged goods and distribution sector to reduce the environmental impact of their packaging and waste paper, the company provides them with systems for reducing, reusing, sorting and recycling waste. Today, some 28 000 companies make use of its services.

What is a ‘Société à Mission‘ ?

The term Sociétés à Mission implies a notion of public benefit, which may be social or environmental, and concerns both companies and members of the public, in metropolitan and overseas France.  For Citeo this involves embedding sustainable development, eco-design and recycling in our daily habits, “to find a response to the ecological emergency and accelerate the transformations that are required”, in order to “preserve our planet, its resources, the biodiversity and the climate”. 70% of household packaging and 57.5 % of waste paper is recycled thanks to the rubbish sorting by people in France that has become the eco-citizen’s first reflex. In phase with this dynamic, Citeo refers to itself as an “accelerator of the circular economy”. 

Five social and environmental goals

Reduce the environmental impact of the products of Citeo’s clients, by embedding the circular economy and eco-design in their practices and strategies;   

Create the right conditions to build solutions for today and for tomorrow combining environmental and economic performance;

Give consumers the keys to reduce the environmental impact of their consumption; 

Co-construct and promote Citeo’s solutions and priorities at local and international scale; 

Foster the commitment of Citeo’s teams in pursuing its mission.

A college of four ‘qualified personalities’ 

Patricia Ricard, appointed to the Comité de Mission in her capacity as president of the Institute, is one of the four members chosen from among ‘qualified personalities’. She will sit alongside Professor Carlos MORENO, an expert on the Smart City, Ms Shu ZHANG, CEO of Pandobac, and Professor Philippe MOATI, Co-founder of the Observatoire Société et Consommation (Obsoco)(society and consumption observatory).

The other members of the mission committee are representatives of the company’s clients, a recycling operator, a non-profit association, an elected official and a member of the company’s staff. The committee will be responsible for monitoring the company’s new role.

Link to the Citeo website

The IUCN World Conservation Congress will now take place in june. Held every four years, the Congress brings together leaders and deciders representing governments, civil society, business and research. The aim is to decide on objectives, priorities and means of action for the conservation of natural spaces and biodiversity. For the first time, the 2020 Congress will be open to the general public.

Organised by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the Ministère de la Transition Ecologique and the Agence France Biodiversité, the Congress is expected to bring together more than 1000 participants. “Forum 2020”, say the organisers, “will be the hub of public debate, focused on demonstrating best practices and innovative ideas for the conservation of nature, establishing new partnerships and working out a route map for action”.

6 Congress themes 

The Congress will be organised around six main themes, covering the major issues that must be dealt with: managing landscapes for nature and humans; conserving freshwater to preserve life; restoring the health of the oceans; speeding up mitigation and adaptation to deal with climate change; upholding rights and ensuring effective and equitable governance; leveraging economic and financial systems for sustainability; and finally, advancing knowledge, learning, innovation and technology, in the interests of sustainable development.

Generation Nature Areas

For the first time since its foundation in 1948, the 2020 Congress will be open to the general public, and the organisers are expecting more than 100 000 visitors. Exhibition areas, set up as a ‘village’ concept, will enable everyone to explore the topics dealt with during the Congress. These Generation Nature Areas will encourage visitors to become more aware of the issues of biodiversity, with fun activities focused on its preservation. The aim is also to provide a real showcase for the actions carried out at a practical level by community associations, regions and businesses. 

France and the IUCN, a special relationship

The outstanding natural heritage of France, a founding member of IUCN, gives it a special role and a particular responsibility in the preservation of biodiversity: continental France possesses 57 % of the types of natural habitat tagged as ‘priority’ at European level, and 40 % of Europe’s flora; France’s 54 regional natural parks and 10 national parks, including 3 in the French Overseas Territories, offer a combination of outstanding terrestrial and marine areas. France also possesses, with its Overseas Territories, the world’s second most extensive maritime domain, covering 11 million km², where are found 10 % of the planet’s coral reefs and 20 % of its atolls, more than 16000 endemic species, and 5 biodiversity hotspots: Mediterranean, Caribbean, Indian Ocean, New Caledonia and Polynesia.

Link to IUCN website

Link to World Conservation Congress website

#IUCNCongress #biodiversity #Marseille #MTES #AFB

In the face of the epizootic that has impacted the fan mussel since 2016, several Mediterranean lagoons seem to have offered refuge to this species: a study carried out a few weeks ago in Thau lagoon confirms the good state of health of these large shellfish.

Since 2016, the fan mussel Pinna nobilis (L.1758), a species endemic to the Mediterranean, has been victim to an epizootic (a parasitic disease related to a Haplosporidium), that has spread throughout the Mediterranean basin. A protected species under European legislation since 1992 (directive 92/43/EEC), the fan mussel has recently been recognised and classified as ‘in critical danger of extinction’ on the IUCN world red list of endangered species.   

But as a team of researchers at the Institute had already observed in the Diana lagoon in Corsica a few months ago, it seems that lagoons constitute refuge areas where the populations aren’t impacted by this parasite. 

A population monitored over several years

In the French Occitanie region, the first cases of mortality were reported in 2018, in the Banyuls-sur-Mer area, before the epizootic spread. A new study, carried out in Thau lagoon by Mathieu Foulquié, Renaud Dupuy of Grandrive, Nicolas Dalias and Nardo Vicente, would seem to confirm this hypothesis. The researchers chose to undertake their study at sites where the fan mussel has been monitored for several years, which means they can have a proper basis for comparison. Monitoring surveys were carried out in May and June 2020 among the populations which had already been inventoried.

These new surveys showed that the populations are in a good state of health, with a seemingly natural lower mortality rate, and that they continue to be regularly replenished.

 To read the full article (in French) on the Marine Life website

Inventory and state of health of populations of Pinna nobilis (L.1758) in Thau lagoon. Mathieu Foulquié, Renaud Dupuy de la Grandrive, Nicolas Dalias et Nardo Vicente.

(Ph. M. Foulquié : young fan mussel)

A few months ago, researchers from the Institute carried out a survey of the fan mussel in the Diana lagoon. The population observed is in good health !

Classified by the IUCN on the list of species in critical danger of extinction, following the epizootic infection which has for 3 years impacted the whole of the Mediterranean, the fan mussel’s hope of survival seems to be confined to the environment of lagoons and coastal ponds.

Sites where the bivalve mollusc is showing resistance to epizootic impact

The lagoons and coastal ponds, in particular in the vicinity of major rivers such as the Rhone and the Ebro, are increasingly seen as pockets of resistance where the fan mussel has survived in a good state of health. This is the case at the Etang de Thau lagoon, on the French coast of Languedoc, El Mar Menor in Spain and the Bay of Kotor in Montenegro. In Corsica, where the mortality rate is almost total, even in the Scandola reserve, it was vital to find out whether the coastal ponds there might also offer refuge to the species.  So Professor Nardo Vicente, Dr Sylvain Couvray and Dr Rémy Simide carried out a survey in the Diana lagoon, on the east coast of the island, where the fan mussel populations had already been studied in 1990.

In the lagoon, a dense, healthy fan mussel population

And the observations carried out this year along the shores of the lagoon have revealed a dense, healthy population of fan mussels. The density is in the order of around ten individuals per square metre, about the same rate as that recorded in 1990. And among the fan mussels found there, the researchers detected no sign of recent suspected mortality, which again adds weight to the hypothesis of the existence of pockets of resistance in the coastal lagoons. “It is important to step up the research effort in these areas”, insist the members of the survey team. “The survival of these individuals is vital for the potential introduction in the fairly near future of programmes for restocking or natural reseeding by dispersal of larval flux in the sea.“

Determining whether recruitment is local or of marine origin

It remains to determine the origin of the larvae that have maintained the dynamism of this population: “For the time being”, Nardo Vicente concludes, “we don’t know whether the input of larvae has come from the sea, passing through the entry channel (grau), or whether it is a matter of local recruitment.“  Regular monitoring over time, a new hydrodynamic study of larvae captured in situ and a genetic study of the populations might provide a way to understand the settlement in the Diana lagoon of such large populations of Pinna nobilis, unaffected by the epizootic infection.

Full article available (in French) at the Marine Life website

The fan mussel, Pinna Nobilis, has joined the group of Critically Endangered species on the IUCN Red List. A classification that is sad news, the direct consequence of the epizootic which has affected the largest bivalve mollusc in the Mediterranean over the past three years. 

The massive mortality of fan mussel populations, let us remember, first occurred in Spain at the end of 2016, in the Alicante region and around the Balearics, where the epizootic wiped out 80 to 100 % of individuals. During the summer of 2017, it progressed to the Catalan coast, then the Gulf of Ajaccio, the marine reserve of Cerbère-Banyuls, and the whole of the coastline of Corsica during the summer of 2018. Since then, the phenomenon has continued to spread around the Mediterranean coasts, and only a few isolated populations still survive.

An endemic species protected since 1992

“In the past,” as the IUCN explains “the main threats were very localised, coming from illegal fishing, loss of habitat, boat anchoring, invasive species, and so on”. But since it was afforded protection in 1992, the fan mussel had recovered to a highly satisfactory population status, in particular in the Marine Protected Areas where density sometimes reached twenty individuals per 100 m², as for example in the Scandola marine reserve. Today the fan mussel is up against a formidable parasite, Haplosporidium pinnae, “which does not seem to attack other species,” as Prof. Nardo Vicente points out, “such as Pinna rudis, for example”.

A parasite which benefits from the rise in temperatures

And the parasite’s activity increases as the water temperature rises.  As has already been observed for other parasites and viruses, it may have been dormant. Today, it benefits from more favourable conditions owing to the global climate change on the planet and the rise in temperature of the Mediterranean waters: the water does not cool down enough in winter, and reaches record temperatures each summer, sometimes even from the end of spring, which enable the parasite to spread and prosper. In practical terms, we cannot prevent it from spreading, even if several laboratories in Mediterranean countries are currently working to better understand its functioning.

Hope lies in a few resistant populations

“The natural recovery of impacted populations”, emphasizes the IUCN communiqué, “will depend solely on resistant individuals and on recruitment”. It is thus indispensable to maintain constant surveillance of the populations, as the Institute has been doing in several Marine Protected Areas, such as the Scandola reserve and the Port-Cros National Park; or through the monitoring network for the French part of the populations, from Monaco to Banyuls, managed and coordinated by Prof. Nardo Vicente: researchers and also scuba diving clubs and environmental protection associations continue to help develop it with their observations.

“Since the natural recovery of the populations will depend on recruitment, it is recommended to monitor colonies of larvae at the impacted sites and not affected by means of larval collectors”, according to the communiqué. “We have already been doing that”, explains Nardo Vicente, “by installing larval collectors since 1996 at various sites on the French Mediterranean coasts (Port-Cros, Scandola, Côte Bleue marine park, Les Embiez archipelago). These collectors enable us to record the changes in the marine biodiversity at a given site”.

In the future, should we transplant fan mussels ?

Among the approaches suggested to save the Mediterranean fan mussel, the IUCN also raises the question of the transplantation of individuals, but stresses the risk of displacing “healthy carriers” which might in turn contaminate populations that had hitherto been spared.  Another idea is to implant “juveniles from larval collectors and from breeding operations off site“.

Link to the PinnaSpot programme

For its fortieth birthday, the scientific journal of the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard — http://marinelife-revue.fr— has a new look.

Originally published in paper format, the journal Vie Marine (Marine Life) was launched in 1979 by Professor Nardo Vicente, the scientific director of the Institute, and currently Chair of the Editorial Board. The purpose of the journal was to publish the work of researchers at the Institute’s research centre on the Ile des Embiez.

Over the years, Vie Marine moved on to include scientific articles by researchers from other organisations, in phase with international standards, under the impetus of Professor Lucien Laubier, a corresponding member of the French Académie des Sciences. Renamed Marine Life/Vie Marine in 1992, the priority for the journal was to continue to meet the requirements of researchers who were eager to publish their findings as soon as possible. Since 2010, the journal has been exclusively available on the Internet.

As soon as they are accepted by the Editorial Board, articles are immediately available online with free access. 

The focus of the journal is still the ‘knowledge and sustainable management of the Mediterranean and its living resources’. It is a valuable tool at the service of scientists for whom the Mediterranean is at the heart of their priorities.

Further information. Instructions to authors

In the coming battle to find a way of dealing with climate change, the Ocean is a key ally. By absorbing much of the carbon in the atmosphere, it offers the planet another chance to go on breathing.

Three experts tell us all about Blue Carbon:

Laurent Bopp, Director of Research CNRS (French National Scientific Research Centre) at the Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique (LMD, Laboratory of Dynamic Meteorology), Institut Pierre-Simon Laplace (IPSL), Paris, explains the mechanisms which give our oceans this ability to store carbon.

Dorothée Herr, Manager, Oceans and Climate Change, International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), explains how blue carbon can play a role in the international policies for combating climate change.

Finally, Chloë Webster, Marine Environment Scientific Consultant, a Mediterranean specialist, explains how the MPAs are key management tools for the preservation of biodiversity and one of the responses to climate change.

Ocean, climate, biodiversity: the vital equation

Everything is linked. And we must at all costs preserve the fragile equilibrium of the interactions between Ocean, climate and biodiversity, as Patricia Ricard, President of the Institute, points out in the Editorial. Preserving the ocean means enabling it to continue to play this vital role, to be the breath of life for the planet. By protecting its habitats, we can succeed in maintaining the biodiversity, which is at the source of .. the blue carbon. All is not lost, we still have our hands on the controls, but we must act now !

Read on !

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The Climate Action Summit and the official publication of the IPCC Report Ocean and Cryosphere within a few days of each other highlight the necessity of taking our destiny in hand in the matter of the climate: as Antonio Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations, insisted in a column in the French newspaper Le Monde last spring, we must at any price “win the battle for the climate”.

A Climate Action Summit to speed up the decision making process

The Climate Action Summit on 23rd September, organised by António Guterres, Secretary General of the UN, is intended as a booster for the implementation of the Paris Agreement on climate change. The signatory countries may well have already produced action plans, but these are not enough to limit the increase in climate warming to a level below 2°C. Given the urgency of the situation, António Guterres is today calling on everyone to make a further effort without delay: “Only much more ambitious actions will do,” he said. “This is why the Summit will target the fields that are at the core of the problem, that is the sectors that generate the most emissions and the areas where the development of resilience will have the greatest impact”.

The Summit, which will bring together members of governments and also deciders from the finance sector and representatives of civil society, should serve as a springboard to introduce, in the very short term, measures aimed at developing ‘cleaner’ economies based on the resilience of ecosystems, and on their ability to absorb climate change-related impacts.
To meet the goals defined by the Paris Agreement is today not an option but a necessity.

A Report, Ocean and Cryosphere, which highlights the urgency of the situation

This special IPCC Report on the Ocean and the Cryosphere (sea ice, glaciers, ice caps and permafrost) highlights the same urgency. Although it will not be officially published until 25th September in Monaco, part of the content has already been revealed. The conclusions of the experts are alarming. They offer estimations of both the impact of climate change on the coastal, polar and mountain ecosystems, and also the impact on populations. We may cite, for example, among other figures, a forecast sea level rise of 40 cm in the oceans by 2100 owing to the melting of glaciers and polar icecaps, and the displacement of more than 280 million people worldwide, but also the thawing of most of the permafrost, which would release into the atmosphere an enormous quantity of carbon trapped in the frozen soil. The picture is far from rosy, and will no doubt be made worse by the increase in flooding episodes, more powerful cyclones, an increase in the acidification of the oceans which will endanger the marine ecosystems.

So this is no longer the time for raising awareness but for the time for action – immediate, targeted and effective. At all levels.

On the occasion of his visit to the island of Les Embiez, Peter Thomson, United Nations (UN) Special Envoy for the Oceans, responded to Patricia Ricard’s questions: he spoke of solutions on nature, of corporate sponsorship, and innovation, his vision for the preservation of the ocean environment. With a clear message: “We have only one ocean, and we will have to find common solutions”.

Peter Thomson, United Nations (UN) Special Envoy for the Oceans was this weekend the guest of Patricia Ricard at the island of Les Embiez on the occasion of the Institute’s General Assembly.

This General Assembly was for him an opportunity to hear about certain environmental issues that are specific to the Mediterranean.
In relation with the research carried out by the Institute’s scientists, several themes were discussed, all core issues for the ecological challenges that must be met for the survival of the Ocean: the restoration of coastal shallow water habitats, innovative solutions to make aquaculture more sustainable without generating additional pressure on fisheries stocks, the detection of environmental DNA for better monitoring of the biodiversity.

From the restoration of coastal habitats to the recycling of plastics

Other visiting experts presented various measures for environmental preservation: Chloë Webster, until recently scientific director MedPAN and today consultant, recalled the importance of the setting up of Marine Protected Areas, stressing the fact that what is important is not to set up more and more MPAs, but rather to give them the tools, and the funding, to enable them to really protect their territory; Christian Decugis, among other functions President of the APAM (Association pour la Pêche et les Activités Maritimes), highlighted the role of ‘sentinels of the sea’ fulfilled by the fishers, and reminded us that the most important thing to preserve the resource is “the proper use of fishing gear, even for small boats”. He also recalled that preservation really works, “as evidenced by the bluefin tuna, with a biomass back to 1950s levels, thanks to several years of fishing bans”. Marine Fidelle, of Ecocéan, presented the techniques for rearing the post-larvae of fishes and the installation of biohuts which are a means to increase the survival rate of juveniles. Simon Bernard, of Plastic Odyssey, recalled that “We cannot clean up the oceans”, but we can reduce our use of plastics and learn to valorise them by recycling. Damien Leloup described an operation run by the Walter Munk Foundation for the Oceans in the Altaussee, an Austrian lake which was also impacted by pollution. Finally, Cécile Devillers, an RSE (corporate social responsibility) specialist at Ricard, explained that there has been a real raising of awareness in companies, from the choice of raw materials to end of life management for the objects produced, but that there is still a lack of knowledge for finding the best suited solutions.

Peter Thomson, responsible for the implementation of SDG 14

A series of presentations that fall directly within the field of competence of Peter Thomson. His role is after all to support the implementation of SDG 14, sustainable development goal n°14, marine life, working with all the stakeholders concerned: civil society, the scientific community, the private sector and the other stakeholders.
The aim is in particular to continue to keep up and running the 1 400 or so voluntary commitments made during the Conference on the Oceans, and to see that they are implemented. Formerly the permanent representative of the Fiji islands at the United Nations, this diplomat today devotes all his energy to serving the cause of the oceans. “One breath out of two”, he declared a few months ago, “derives from oxygen produced by the Ocean. So it is time for us to make radical changes“.

(Ph. C. F-B)

The Two Shores Summit, the Mediterranean Forum, will be held in Marseille on 24th June 2019. The aim is to give a new impetus to the dynamic of cooperation in the western Mediterranean, basing it on civil society. Patricia Ricard, President of the Institute, has been designated to lead the French delegation.

Launched at the initiative of President Macron, the Two Shores Summit has been defined as “an unprecedented mobilisation of civil society in the Mediterranean countries”. 10 States will take part, 5 from the northern shore countries, and 5 from the southern shore: for the South, Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya; for the North, Portugal, Spain, France, Italy and Malta. The European Union, Germany as well as pan-Mediterranean organisations and the major international economic organisations in the region are also associated.

To generate practicable solutions

The aim is to generate practicable solutions for the sustainable development of the region, at the human and economic levels. All the ideas and proposed initiatives will be shared with the heads of state and of governments during the Marseille Summit to determine which are to be given priority for implementation.
These initiatives may be completely new, or at the stage of technical implementation, or already existing and worth retriggering. They may take the form of collective actions, specific projects, suggestions for common public policy, common concepts, institutions to be created, Mediterranean concepts and regulations, etc. The sole imperative is that they should have a regional or multilateral character.

The ‘One Hundred’

One hundred personalities from the civil society of the western Mediterranean will make up the steering committee for the Summit. They have been chosen by the ten States concerned, and a leader had been designated for each country. Patricia Ricard, President of the Institut Océanographique Paul Ricard, is the leader of the French delegation. They will all meet on 11th and 12th June at Tunis for a survey exercise referred to as the ‘Assembly of the One Hundred’, during which they will appeal to the heads of state and of governments of the 5+5 Dialogue to take into account their proposals for practicable actions.

Five preparatory forums

Prior to the Marseille Summit, five preparatory forums will be held between April and June: the Energies forum organised by Algeria (Algiers, 8th 2019), ‘Towards an enhanced partnership at the service of a sustainable transition in energy’; a forum ‘Youth, education, mobility’, organised by Malta (Valetta, 24th and 25th April, 2019), ‘The Mediterranean Generation : Malta’s Contribution to the Summit of the Two Shores’; the forum ‘Economics and competitiveness’, organised by Morocco (Rabat, 29th April 2019), ‘Improved economic integration between the two shores, towards a partnership zone for shared growth and innovation’; the forum ‘Culture, the media, tourism’, organised by France   (Montpellier, 2nd and 3rd May 2019), ‘Driving a new cultural dynamic in the western Mediterranean’; the forum ‘Environment and sustainable development’, organised by Italy (Palermo, 15th and 16th May 2019), ‘Blue economics, green economics, circular economics: proposals for partnerships for sustainable urban coastal development in the western Mediterranean’.

Source : France Diplomatie

A laboratory of ideas to meet the challenges of climate change. Last week, Patricia Ricard took part in the One Planet Summit in Nairobi as a member of the laboratory of ideas, One Planet Lab. The aim of these meetings is to speed up the worldwide transition towards a low carbon economy.

The One Planet Summit

The coalitions of the One Planet Summit met on 14 March in Nairobi, Kenya, for the third of these summits. The meeting was focused on initiatives for the protection of the environment and transition on the African continent. While Africa is only responsible for 4% of worldwide emissions of greenhouse gases, 65% of the population of Africa is considered as directly impacted by climate change. The Summit brought together leaders, corporate heads and personalities representing young people and civil society, gathered to present real innovative achievements, and to call for new commitments.

The One Planet Lab, a laboratory of ideas

The One Planet Lab was officially launched on 26 September 2018 in New York, on the occasion of the second One Planet Summit, following the appeal by Emmanuel Macron. Consisting of 31 personalities representing companies and institutions, its mission is to provide material for future One Planet Summits. A true laboratory of ideas, it brings together influential personalities from the universities, NGOs, business and international financial institutions, recognised for their expertise and their determination to take action for the benefit of the environment.

Effective actions

The aim of each One Planet Summit is to bring together and to extend to a broader scale effective actions to meet the challenges related to climate change, the loss of biodiversity and the wellbeing of societies. One year after the first Summit, thirty actions have been initiated, with a four-fold focus: the climate and the mobilisation of funds, and the protection of the oceans and of biodiversity.

Source : https://www.ecologique-solidaire.gouv.fr/one-planet-lab-se-reunit-paris

Under the scientific exchange programme between the Institute and the Korean Maritime and Ocean University at Busan, two students have been welcomed this winter at Les Embiez island: supervised by Dr Robert Bunet, So Im Cheon and Eunha Kim have been working on aspects of the genetics of marine organisms.

For the third year running, the Institute’s research laboratory has hosted students from the prestigious KMOU, Korean Maritime and Ocean University, in South Korea. The aim of these exchanges, launched in 2016 at the initiative of Patricia Ricard as part of the programme ‘Take Ocean For Future’, is to generate a common dynamic focused on the major challenges facing ‘our’ Mediterranean and all the world’s oceans. “In the face of climate warming and the threats that menace our environment”, stresses Patricia Ricard, “science and research should today push back their disciplinary, national and cultural frontiers”.

From antifouling to aquaculture

In 2017, Dr Jin-Woo Lee stayed at Les Embiez for a few weeks. He worked in collaboration with Dr Robert Bunet in research on the antifouling properties of marine organisms. Together, they tested various molecules with the aim of finding an alternative to antifouling paints for boats, which are highly polluting and harmful for the environment.
In 2018, the programme Take OFF provided the framework to welcome Bok Il Jang, a young engineer working on the nutrition of aquatic animals. During his stay, he worked on feeds for species in aquaculture, and on alternatives to the use of meal from wild fish, which aggravates overfishing (insect-based meals, etc.).

The plan is to continue and develop these exchanges by including other universities, once the Institute’s new research platform becomes fully operational.

Barely a year ago, the Scandola marine reserve was home to an outstanding population of the fan mussel, Pinna nobilis. Last week, Professor Nardo Vicente could only bear witness to the death of all the fan mussels. Here is his report on the situation.

The situation is worrying.

We are just back from a scientific field survey at the Scandola marine reserve in Corsica, which only a year ago possessed one of the highest densities of this magnificent bivalve shellfish in the western Mediterranean.

Today, they are all dead ! A population we have been monitoring since the 1980s !
There are dead fan mussels scattered all over the seabed.
And this parasitosis is now reaching the coasts of Provence. In September, staff members of the Parc National des Calanques found a dying fan mussel in the Anse du Mugel at La Ciotat. The analysis proved positive for Haplosporidium. Other sick specimens have been observed at various points along the Provencal coast.
At Scandola, well into October, the water was still 22°C at 40 m depth. This was also the case along the whole of the coastline of Provence.
It is to be feared that this epizootic outbreak may progressively affect all the Mediterranean coasts, as specimens infected by parasites have been reported at various points in Monaco, Italy, Malta, Tunisia and Greece.

WATERS THAT ARE TOO WARM FAVOUR THE ACTIVITY OF PARASITES

The activity of the parasite responsible for the death of the fan mussels is in fact intensified when the temperature rises. And the water temperatures in the Mediterranean have been consistently high since the beginning of summer. We might therefore assume that global climate change is to a large extent responsible for the outbreak of this epidemic, which affects the largest of the Mediterranean bivalves.
It is probable that the increasingly rapid warming of the waters of the Mediterranean will in the near future affect other species. There have indeed been signs of this for several years now: the collection of larvae that we have been carrying out since the 1990s in the Marine Protected Areas (Port-Cros, Scandola, Côte Bleue marine park) and around the Les Embiez archipelago has enabled us to study the marine biodiversity of these sites.

Thanks to these larvae collection operations, along with young fan mussels, numerous other species from various zoological groups (mollusks, crustaceans, echinoderms, ascidians, fishes) are to be found in the larvae collections. And from 1996 to 2013, we have been able to observe a 30% erosion of the biodiversity of species of mollusks caught, and 70% of small species of invertebrates have disappeared. This phenomenon is likely to get worse in coming years, if nothing is done to slow down the warming of the planet.

Since last winter, many laboratories around the Mediterranean have been constantly monitoring the fan mussel populations, and several hundred individuals in a good state of health have been collected and taken to safety, in particular in Spain. The survival of the species may be at stake.

In addition, there have been shipping disasters such as the one that has recently occurred at Cap Corse, with a potentially catastrophic impact on the living environment, and for the economy. Because of the incompetence of ships’ crews, we are back to the 1970s and the tanker shipwrecks that became so notorious.

And yet, oil pollution is just the tree that hides the forest ..

Nardo VICENTE

The survey team : Sylvain Couvray, Rémy Simide, Aurélie Vion et Nardo Vicente.