Blue World Institute is participating in a new project: “ECOSS – Ecological Observing System in the Adriatic Sea: oceanographic observations for biodiversity“. There are 10 partner institutions from Croatia and Italy, collaborating under the leadership of the Italian National Research Council’s Institute of Marine Sciences (CNR-ISMAR) towards achieving the main goal of the project – the establishment of the ECOlogical observing system in the Adriatic Sea (ECOAdS). The ECOAdS will be shared between Italy and Croatia, and is foreseen to integrate ecological and oceanographic research and monitoring with Natura 2000 conservation strategies. To achieve this, ECOSS will build upon existing facilities, infrastructure and long-term ecological data to create synergy between marine observation capacities and requirements for achieving and maintaining good conservation status of the marine component of the Natura 2000 sites in the Adriatic Sea.

This project started on 1st January 2019 and will be conducted over the following 30 months. The first meeting of the project partners has already been held with other project activities to follow: meetings, workshops, case studies, educational material etc. The project will soon launch a website with more details on activities and options to get involved. The overall value of the project is 3.390.551,05 EUR, of which 85% is financed by the European Union through the CBC Programme Interreg Italy-Croatia. The project, submitted under Priority axis 3: Environment and cultural heritage and within Specific Objective 3.2: Contribute to protect and restore biodiversity, has been evaluated as one of the top ten projects accepted for financing.

Project coordinator in Blue World Institute is mr. Grgur Pleslić.