CROATIA
Ambitious cross-border project will protect vulnerable seagrass meadows in the Adriatic
Free anchoring of vessels must be curtailed A project with Croatian and Italian institutions as partners is ďŹ nding solutions to reduce the threat to Adriatic seagrass meadows from human activities. The SASPAS project will deploy different strategies to improve seagrass preservation and restoration.
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eagrasses in the Adriatic (and in other seas) are among the most important habitats in the Mediterranean. These marine plants form large fields in shallow coastal waters. Their location makes them accessible, but also exposes them to threats from both land and sea. Seagrasses are important for the multiple ecosystem services they provide, including breeding and nursery grounds for fish and other marine creatures, coastal protection, oxygen generation, and carbon sequestration. Seagrasses vary greatly in size with some very small plants reaching just a few centimetres above the seabed, while others extend up to 80 cm into the water column. Their roots may also vary causing different impacts on the sediment. Despite the benefits that seagrasses provide they are endangered. Coastal development, rising levels of nautical traffic, and increasing activities both commercial and recreational along the coast are threatening seagrass meadows and the services they provide.
Many years of experience in seagrass protection Sunce, a Croatian environmental NGO, has been working for the protection of seagrasses for a
Seagrass meadows in the Adriatic provide multiple environmental services but are threatened by human activities along the coast and are in urgent need of protection.
decade; mapping their distribution, monitoring their status, and studying the factors that impact them, among other activities. The organisation’s expertise in this area make it a valuable partner in the consortium behind the SASPAS (Safe Anchoring and Seagrass Protection in the Adriatic Sea) project. An Interreg Italy-Croatia Cross Border Cooperation Programme funded initiative SASPAS brings together Italian and Croatian organisations in an effort to improve marine seagrass preservation and restoration through laying safe anchorage systems, performing pilot transplantations, carrying out monitoring activities
and by defining an integrated management system for marine seagrasses in the Adriatic area. This in turn will conserve biodiversity in the Adriatic Sea ecosystem and decrease its vulnerability to impacts such as those of climate change. SASPAS areas include Natura 2000 sites where analyses of the interactions between social, economic, and environmental systems will be undertaken to identify cause and effect relationships and the responses to be implemented. Marine seagrass beds are widespread along both the Croatian and Italian coasts and
their conservation status is similar in both countries, so significant results can be achieved only by setting up a good cross-border cooperation which is achieved with SASPAS. The project consortium is led by the Italian municipality of Monfalcone at the northern end of the Adriatic and has seven partners of which three are from Croatia. The cross-border approach ensures coordinated planning and implementation of the protection and restoration activities, as well as joint development of the Marine Seagrass Safeguard Integrated Management Programme — the proposed guidelines for management and EVSPlTI Magazine 3 / 2020
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