BLUE4ALL is a HORIZON Europe Ocean Mission project working towards addressing marine conservation and restoration challenges in Europe. It proposes a new approach to Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) that aligns with EU Biodiversity Strategy and national initiatives. The project places stakeholders at the center of the MPA process, ensuring their needs and concerns are addressed from the outset. BLUE4ALL will work with stakeholders from 25 information sites and Living labs in the Mediterranean Sea, Baltic Sea, and North-East Atlantic regions to develop tools for preserving and restoring the marine environment in a socially sustainable and acceptable way. These tools will be tested in Living labs, and ultimately result in a user-friendly Blueprint Platform for creating effective, efficient, and resilient MPAs and networks of MPAs. The project will run from January 2023 to December 2026.
KEY FACTS
Ocean Mission
BLUE4ALL is funded by the Horizon Europe Mission Ocean and aims to achieving the EU MISSION on Restore our Oceans and Waters by 2030.
Duration
The project runs from January 2023 to December 2026.
Living Laboratories and Information sites
Blue4All includes 25 MPAs and MPA networks (11 Information Sites and 14 Living Labs), from small, coastal MPAs to large MPA networks protecting deep-sea habitats. The sites are located in the Baltic Sea, the Mediterranean Sea and the North-East Atlantic, with an additional site in Brazilian waters to help identify international good practice.
Throughout the project, information sites and Living Labs will provide direct insight in MPA processes, their challenges and solutions. The 14 Living Labs will serve to validate the developed Blueprint Platform for successful co-management of marine protected areas under the kind of geographical (e.g. location, size, habitats and governance (e.g. protection status, degree of stakeholders involvement) conditions representing the majority of MPAs in EU waters.
Partners
The project brings together 22 partners from different institutions from all around Europe (Belgium, France, Italy, Germany, The Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Montenegro, Croatia, Ireland and Switzerland.
Sister/relevant projects
BLUE4ALL Timeline
START OF THE PROJECT
Establishment of the BLUE4ALL Governance Structure
Launching of the BLUE4ALL website
Assessment criteria for economic, social and governance topics
Criteria for assessing relevant ecological and environmental dimensions in project information sites and Living labs
Information packages collected from information sites delivered to WP2 and WP3 for analysis (one per info site)
Formation of the MPA Network Knowledge Transfer Platform
A protocol for collecting information on needs from the Living labs and to give instructions on validating and co-creating economic, social and governance tools
Compile and integrate information gathered from project information sites and Living labs for providing essential and easy-to-use ecological and environmental knowledge for MPA processes
Information packages on governance, socio-economic, ecological and environmental needs of the Living labs delivered to WP2 and WP3
Set of socio-economic, business and governance tools for final validation and co-creation by the Living labs
Protocol for identifying needs and an initial set of promising ecology-based tools to support MPA processes to be assessed in the Living labs
Synthesis and detail assessment of ecology-based tools to support MPA practitioners
Tool validation
Robust social and governance tools towards effective, efficient and resilient networks of MPAs
Portfolio of optimized spatially defined ecology-based tools, and associated supporting information technologies to support consolidation and assessment of MPA networks in Living labs
Prototype BLUE4ALL Blueprint Platform developed
User-friendly interactive web-based Blueprint platform for achieving effective, efficient and resilient MPAs and MPA networks
END OF THE PROJECT