Marine

MUSES Update

March 8, 2019 by Marine Directorate Communications No Comments | Category Marine Directorate general, Marine Directorate Science

After 2 years, the Horizon 2020 funded, Multi-use in European Seas (MUSES) project has come to an end.

The project, which began on 1st November 2016 and ran until 31st October 2018, investigated marine Multi-use (MU) in the 5 European sea basins (Baltic Sea, North Sea, Black Sea, Mediterranean and Eastern Atlantic). The aim of the project was to contribute to policy, legal and administrative harmonisation and to suggest improvements to overcome barriers to MU.

Lead by Marine Scotland, the MUSES consortium was made of 10 partners from 7 different European countries. We were a mix of consultancies, academia and government bodies – this resulted in a strong team with complementary skills from across all the organisations.

In addition to the Work Packages that oversaw the day-to-day project management and dissemination of material from the project, there were three other key Work Packages which formed the core of the project:

• Sea Basin Overview of Multi-Uses (Regional overviews of MU, which take into account each sea basin and key obstacles and drivers to MU identified)
• Case Studies (a series of MU case studies with different thematic, geographic and focus area dimensions, and engage local stakeholders to identify drivers, added values, barriers and impacts of MU)
• An Ocean Multi-Use Action Plan.

The main key deliverable for MUSES was the Action Plan which was developed to determine the real opportunities for multi-use in European Seas, including the scope for innovation and Blue Growth potential. The Action Plan was also created and refined based on stakeholder engagement and input, especially as a result of the 2nd workshop, held in 2018.

MUSES in Athens 2018

The project concluded with a Final Conference which was held in Brussels at the beginning of October 2018. Here, we were able to present our complete findings to over 60 stakeholders (made up of government departments, European Commission representatives, industry and academia) from across Europe. This was also the first presentation of the Action Plan to a large audience and it generated a great deal of discussion on the findings and recommendations for future projects.

And the future? Work will continue on some aspects of the project between Marine Scotland and others, and the excellent working relationships that Marine Scotland has developed with the other members of the consortium will be maintained and MUSES shall continue to be promoted across Europe.

All of the project reports are available to download at the project website at: www.muses-project.eu.

Further Information

• MUSES Project

Tags: Baltic Sea, Black Sea, Eastern Atlantic, Mediterranean, MUSES, North Sea

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