| Issue # 5 - March 2007 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Editorial: Evaluating ENCORA progressThe ENCORA Coordination Action has entered its second year. The first annual management and activity reports have been submitted to the Commission. The overall progress of ENCORA meets the expectations. Some activities have triggered directly an enthusiastic response (the Coastal Wiki, for instance), while others are becoming popular more slowly (such as the Contact Search service). All participating countries have established coastal networks and they have launched a national website for sharing knowledge and information among coastal professionals. Are the ENCORA services already well known and appreciated? What is needed to increase the effectiveness of these services? The ENCORA Portal has been visited over 100.000 times by more than 15000 visitors in the past four months. Were these visitors satisfied, did they find the information they were looking for? CoastNet, one of the ENCORA partners, will contact a broad group of users for an evaluation over the coming months. ENEWS will inform you later about the results.  National news in this issue
 International news is in this issue
  Contact DatabaseThe registration forms for the ENCORA Contact Database can now be downloaded from the ENCORA portal. By registering you will be better known by your colleagues throughout Europe and they can more easily contact you. This can be helpful if you want to participate in European cooperation projects, or if you want to broaden your personal professional network. The Contact Data Base will continue growing, not only during the ENCORA project, but also afterwards. It is being hosted, maintained and updated by VLIZ, the Flanders Marine Institute.  Coastal WikiParticipants of the ENCORA theme workshops are still adding their contributions to the Coastal Wiki (coastal and marine wikipedia). The Coastal Wiki is now open for visitors; by entering username: encora and password: encoravisit you may view the progress. The content list of the Coastal Wiki contains already a large number of topics. However, for many of them only a general definition is given and no article is available yet. If you are willing to contribute please contact info@encora.eu to join one of the ENCORA themes and obtain editing authorisation. We welcome your contribution! FP7Many consortia are preparing proposals for the first call of the EU Framework Programme. One of the proposals in preparation is a Support Action to extend and update the Coastal Wiki with results of recent and upcoming marine FP projects. The FP7 interest list on the ENCORA Portal, www.encora.eu/documents/Fp7interest.pdf , has been consulted by many proposal leaders to form a well balanced consortium. A few institutes have missed the opportunity to join the list and are still looking for partners: - The Technical University Hamburg-Harburg seeks to establish a consortium for submitting a proposal “Insuleur Net” on Tourism and Environment at European Islands, topic ENV 2.1.4.2., contact t.albers@tuhh.de . - The Indian NGO institute Anchorage (www.idigitalbridge.org ) would like to participate as eligible non-EU partner in a proposal on environmental protection and management, contact asha@idigital.org . Theme 1 Workshop The Socio-Economic Impacts on Coastal Zones and their Evaluation in a Context of ICZMOver 50 participants from many EU countries attended the Theme 1 workshop in Venice, 12-13 March. Presentations highlighted different attempts to rationalize coastal zone management by means of valuation concepts. The proceedings are published on www.encora.corila.it/Events/Conference/News.html . Many different disciplines were represented, giving rise to interesting and sometimes passionate exchange of views. Participants also debated the Coastal Wiki, in particular questions related to the target audience and quality control. Agreements were made among the participants to produce a set of articles, which together will provide a substantial overview of the state of the art. Theme 7 Workshop Marine Biological EvaluationThe theme 7 workshop, hosted by the University of Gent, on 6-8 December 2006, dealt with the restoration and preservation of coastal biodiversity. The ultimate aim of this Theme is the development of a protocol for biological valuation in the coastal zone with a broad scientific support, applicable to a wide range of European coastlines. The workshop was a joint venture with the EU Network of Excellence MARBEF (www.marbef.org ). Marine biological valuation encompasses the determination of the value of the marine environment from a nature conservation perspective. As such, marine biological valuation aims at providing an integrated view on nature’s intrinsic value (i.e. without any reference to anthropogenic use), as opposed to socio-economic valuation aiming at the quantification of the goods and services. Because there is an ever increasing use of the marine environment, practitioners, stakeholders and policy makers request clear and simple baseline maps in order to allow them make well-deliberated choices: e.g. usage maps may be applied to detect conflicts in spatial distribution of human activities, whereas sedimentology maps allow to deliberately identify suitable aggregate extraction zones. These maps are indispensable within the process of spatial planning. However, a protocol to develop baseline biological valuation maps, differentiating between the intrinsic values within an area, does not exist. Consequently, when such maps are needed, one is often obliged to trust the available best expert judgment. The workshop was very constructive and led to changes in the prototype biological valuation concept (selection of the valuation criteria and biodiversity elements which should be included in the concept) and suggestions were made for the practical application of this concept on case study areas by refining and updating the prototype valuation protocol. Also, agreements were made concerning the protocol testing on case study areas: which case study areas are already selected and which ones should be added to the list, which tests should be performed, who is responsible for the different case study areas, etc. The Coastal Wiki will be used to disseminate the future developments in marine biological valuation to a wider scientific public and to show results of the biological valuation of the different case study areas. Presentations and workshop report can be found on the ENCORA website in the ‘Documents’ section. Launch of the African Marine AtlasThe Atlas for Africa (ODINAFRICA), developed by the Ocean Data and Information Network with support from the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) and the Government of Flanders, provides substantial maps, images, data and information to coastal resource managers, planners and decision-makers from various administrative institutions and specialized agencies in Africa. It can be accessed at http://iodeweb2.vliz.be/omap/OMAP/index.htm . The Atlas will benefit national institutions and a variety of users such as environmentalists, local administrators, park managers, the scientific community, fishing cooperatives, tourists, hotelkeepers, teachers, NGOs, the general public, and any other interested persons. It has over 800 downloadable data products derived from the fields of marine geo-sphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, biosphere, geopolitical and the human socio-economic dimensions. 4-D Topography Evolution in Europe: Uplift, Subsidence and Sea-Level ChangeFollowing an agreement with funding organisations in 19 countries, the European Science Foundation is launching a Call for Outline Proposals for Collaborative Research Projects (CRPs) to be undertaken within the EUROCORES Programme “4-D Topography Evolution in Europe: Uplift, Subsidence and Sea Level Change” (TOPO-EUROPE). The Programme will run for 3-4 years depending on national funding regulations and will include national research funding, as well as support for networking and dissemination activities provided by the ESF1. The Programme aims to support high-quality multidisciplinary research. Information: www.esf.org/activities/eurocores/programmes/topo-europe.html |  | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
National news is in this issue
Dansk-svensk kystseminar Husk! Sidste frist for tilmelding den 10. april. Den 2.-3. maj 2007 arrangerer DANCORE og SENCORE et kystseminar i hhv. Malmø (2. maj) og København (3. maj). Tanken er dels at styrke båndene mellem vore lande dels at udveksle informationer om, hvad der foregår på "den anden side". For yderligere information om program og tilmelding klik på nedenstående link. Program Nye medlemmerDANCORE har på nuværende tidspunkt 133 medlemmer. I marts er der kommet 13 nye medlemmer til fra følgende institutioner og firmaer: DMI, DONG Energy Renewables, Aalborg Universitet, Danmarks Fiskeriundersøgelser, Syddansk Universitet, Københavns Universitet, KC Denmark A/S, Roskilde Universitetscenter, Skov- og Naturstyrelsen, IFM og Miljøcenter Ringkøbing. ESF Marine Board Report on "Climate Change Impacts on the European Marine and Coastal Environment"The report can be downloaded from: http://www.vliz.be/EN/Intro/news Nyhedsbrev nr. 1 fra netværk om invasive marine arterStyregruppen for netværket omkring invasive marine arter har lavet et nyhedsbrev. Læs mere I-CoNet/ENCORA Conference - Towards the Sustainable Development of Ireland's Coast12-13 April 2007, Cork, Ireland April will see the 1st I-CoNet/ENCORA national coastal conference for Ireland taking place in Cork. I-CoNet would welcome the participation of any members from the fellow national networks - the event covers a number of thematic and cross cutting topics and provides a good opportunity for Irish practitioners to network with their European counterparts. There is no conference fee. Cork can be reached by direct flights from London (Stansted, Heathrow and Gatwick), Amsterdam, Paris, Madrid, Barcelona, Rome and Berlin. Please contact Cathal O'Mahony in case of questions: c.omahony@ucc.ie Read more Short Course on Shore Protection Strategies17-20 September 2007, Toscana, Italy Read more INTERCOH'079th International Conference on Nearshore and Estuarine Cohesive Sediment Transport Processes 25-28 September 2007, Brest, France Read more COAST ExhibitionFrom 3 May 2007 onwards, Denmark's Aquarium Read more
|  Colophon The ENCORA objective is to facilitate and create new opportunities for sharing knowledge and experience on coastal issues in Europe. This electronic newsletter will inform you frequently about the activities and achievements of the network. Every issue will contain a section with news about your national network or ICZM related topics in your country. This electronic newsletter may be forwarded freely to others working in the ICZM fiels. If you would like to receive the ENCORA Newsletter directly, please contact your national coordinator or subscribe to www.encora.org. News-items for publication can be send to encore@rikz.rws.minvenw.nl. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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