Climate change poses a significant challenge to African societies within the next decades. Direct effects such as droughts and water shortages will be amplified through increased economic and population growth. To combat climate change effects and maintain the livelihoods of the peoples is thus the major aim of WASCAL. Marine resources will play a significant role in the future supply of protein for human nutrition in West Africa.

Bottom contacting fishing is being criticised for destroying seafloor habitats. However, there is a broad range of combinations of fishing gears, habitats and associated ecosystems questioning whether such general statement holds true. Each possible combination of gear and habitat type will exhibit a different degree of impact or damage to seafloor integrity. Although the mechanisms how fishing impacts on seafloor integrity are well understood, results cannot easily be applied to specific regions and fishery – habitat combinations. Each and every benthic habitat and associated ecosystem is unique, so that for a reliable evaluation of fishing impacts, the specific combination of habitat and fishery needs to be assessed. CRANIMPACT will specifically address the brown shrimp fishery in the Southern North Sea for a re-evaluation of their impacts on seafloor integrity of the Wadden Sea National Park. A combination of experimental fisheries and historic data will form the basis for the analyses.

In geschützten Meeresgebieten soll die Fischerei besonders reguliert werden. Wir analysieren die Auswirkungen dieser geplanten Maßnahmen auf die Fischerei.

Despite a long tradition of a commercial exploitation of brown shrimp in the North Sea, there are still major gaps in our knowledge about the biology, ecology and population dynamics of this species. Our aim is to change this!

Age composition data for fish stocks are essential input parameters for stock assessment. It is therefore necessary to permanently develop age determination methodology further.

The Data Collection Framework (DCF), co-funded by the EU, allows Member States to collect fisheries data relevant for the sustainable management of fish stocks.

Brown shrimp fishery is from the economic point of view the most important fishery in Germany. Our research aims to develop a sustainable and ecologically sound fishery.

Tope is the biggest shark species resident in German waters and is classified as "critically endangered". Tagging experiments with satellite pop-up tags in the North Sea are expected to provide information on migration behaviour of this species and thus allow a more precise estimate of distribution and population size.

The shallow waters of the German Bight and Wadden Sea serve as nursery grounds for several commercially important fish species. Annual abundance and growth assessments of youngfish allow for a first indication of the level of incoming catches in future years.

Coupling of hydrographic measurements and model data to investigate the influence of varaible hydrographic conditions on population dynamics of fish stocks in the North Sea and North Atlantic.

The management of marine natural resources in small island states - large ocean countries often poses certain challenges due to the extent of marine environment to be covered and the according logistics and infrastructure. Likewise, significant efforts are required to let policy makers and often remote communities fully participate in decision making processes. Data on the extent and dynamics of the natural resources as well as the notion of drivers of change are needed to understand ways to improve their state and utilization, to maintain and preserve vulnerable parts of the ecosystem and provide means for the local communities to improve their livelihoods.

The Benguela Upwelling System, off southern Africa, belongs to the most productive marine ecosystems on earth and supports many important fisheries. In TRAFFIC, scientists from Germany, Namibia and the Republic of South Africa investigate the efficiency of its food chains.

The German brown shrimp fishery got a sustainability certificate (MSC ecolabel) since 2017. Unlike other fisheries that are subject to a management plan of the European Union, the prerequisite for the MSC ecolabel is an internal self-management of the shrimp fishery. The CranMan project aims at creating the scientific basis to accompany and improve the self-management of the shrimp fishery.

Climate variability and change directly and indirectly affect the distribution and productivity of marine fishes including commercially important fish species. Most of the alterations in productivity are thought to be driven by changes in growth and survival of the fish early life stages. We aim at a better mechanistic understanding of how bottom-up processes (e.g. temperature, prey) impact larval vital rates (e.g. survival, growth) by using North Sea herring as a case study.

Scientists from Europe, Brazil and southern Africa are comprehensively investigating the current state, driving forces and potential future of South Atlantic regions.

As holistic approach, the Marine Strategy Framework Directive poses a challenge to the scientific community: How to describe the state of the marine environment with 11 descriptors? We develop indicators, techniques in risk assessments, and integrated assessment frameworks.

Benthic fish habitats are subject to change - due to climate impacts as well as fisheries activities. This project aims at documenting the availability of benthic infauna for demersal fishes, investigating the relationship of the variability in infauna biomass and species composition to changes ingroundfish communities.

This research activity will enhance multi-species models (improved diet selection models and recruitment models) to enable best possible projections of stocks developments. This will contribute to a sustainable harvest of fish stocks inside an ecosystem approach. Not only fisheries influence fish stocks but also predation and other environmental factors.

Knowledge on the strength of the recruiting year class of a fish stock is of tremendous importance for sustainable mangement. Successful reproduction and foraging of fry are of essential importance for the further development of the stock.

Competition for space is increasingly an issue in coastal zones. Multiple uses create complex issues for ocean governance and management. "How to evaluate the interactions between coastal fisheries, aquaculture and other activities in coastal areas?" is the central resarch question addressed by COEXIST.

The main aim of this project is to build a constructive network between all institutions that are responsible for monitoring in the North and Celtic Seas, concerning both fisheries and environmental monitoring.

The Wadden Sea is an important and sensitive ecosystem. Long-term monitoring of the different ecosystem components is essential in order to understand the processes and their dynamics in this unique habitat. The main goal of this project is to assess the development and status of the fish fauna in the German Wadden Sea area by means of analysing updated monitoring data.

Climate predictions in the tropical-subtropical Atlantic bear a high degree of uncertainty and even bias. Biological long-term data sets are used to support model evaluation and in turn, improved climate predictions are applied to improve forecasts for biological distribution and stock abundance models.

The importance of the seafloor for a healthy ecosystem: Evaluation of pressures, state and services of benthic ecosystems in the German Bight of the North Sea.

What is the ecological state of the seafloor in the German EEZ of the North Sea? Information about sedimentology, geochemistry, biology and anthropogenic pressures is compiled and used for developing a concept for ecosystem-based risk assessment.

The project as part of a strategic partnership to West African countries puts forward a vision of ecosystem based management of regional natural resources.

How organic residues on ear stones help us to discriminate between different redfish stocks.

The aim of the project is to improve the data basis for multi species and ecosystem models. Predator-prey relationships are an important driver of fish population dynamics.

The European seas undergo significant changes. These are caused by multiple vectors of change. Within the VECTORS project, we seek to identify the causal mechanisms and consequences of those changes in our marine ecosystems.

How can the efficiency of a current or future spatial management approach be assessed in relation to stated management objectives? MESMA has produced a set of coherent management tools (concepts, models and methods) for Monitoring, Evaluation and implementation of Spatially Managed marine Areas (SMAs), based on European collaboration.

The East Greenland ecosystem has been influenced by warming in the North Atlantic in recent years. As a consequence, there were distinct changes in the distribution and composition of the fish fauna in this area. The aim of this project is to investigate the functional relationships of climatic and biological changes and to estimate their impact on the fish stocks, fishing and fisheries management.

This project will synthesize exisiting scientific knowledge as baisis for better management of the brown shrimp fishery in the North Sea.