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EU Blue Economy Observatory
Call for proposalsClosed

Integration of socio-ecological models into the Digital Twin Ocean

Details

Status
Closed
Publication date
17 January 2023
Opening date
Deadline model
Single-stage
Deadline date
20 September 2023, 17:00 (CEST)

Description

Actions for the implementation of the Mission Restore our ocean and waters by 2030 (HORIZON-MISS-2023-OCEAN-01)

Expected outcomes should complement the capacities and uses of the European Digital Twin Ocean (EU DTO) by:

  • Solutions to the challenges of marine social-ecological modelling that will allow for their seamless incorporation in the framework of the Digital Twin Ocean, taking into consideration their complex nature. Marine social-ecological models aim to integrate modelling approaches originating from different disciplines, focusing on different levels of analysis and implementing different methodological frameworks in a meaningful way. The challenges include interoperability of transdisciplinary data (ecological, social, economic, legal, etc.); integration of models with different spatial and temporal resolutions, calculation of uncertainties and more.
  • Social-ecological models, developed with a multi-actor approach, that would help assess the impacts of environmental changes, human pressures and/or policy implementation on the overall ocean health, blue economy and societal prosperity;
  • Improved understanding of complex social-ecological systems, aiming at better management of human activities, policy implementation, responding to societal needs (local communities, economic activities, growing resources needs,…) and avoiding negative outcomes of policies such as the loss of jobs, overfishing, hypoxia, or stock collapse.

Proposals should address all activities and tasks as described below, in cooperation and complementarity with the linked actions and other relevant actions:

  • Address the long-term and reliable accessibility and availability of spatially explicit social and economic data, fit-for-purpose for the development of social-ecological models and other relevant approaches as described below. The social and economic data should be integrated with the available marine data sources and models of the DTO in an interoperable and standardised manner. This should include considerations related to spatial and temporal scale of analysis and data collection, development of methodological protocols to connect socio-economic data with environmental data, etc.
  • Development of a wide range of social-ecological models, tools and applications, from simple impact assessment models, to agent-based models, to integrated social-ecological models, with capacity to run and assess a variety of normative (what-if) scenarios, evaluating the impact and long-term effect of environmental change, policy alternatives and management decisions to coastal and marine systems, both environmentally and societally.
  • Assessment of existing or development of new parallel frameworks of analysis, other than models (e.g. statistical approaches, AI) to be integrated into the framework of the DTO. As not all aspects of socio-economic systems and behaviours can be assessed through numerical models, other methodologies should be investigated and developed, to ensure inclusion of these parts of the system into the DTO and link them appropriately with the social-ecological models.
  • Development of integrated ecological and socio-economic indicators that can be used in the assessment of the impacts of environmental, policy or management change in coastal and marine social-ecological systems.
  • Development of new processes and tools for decision-support, participatory management and policy scenarios assessment, including the methodological approaches to effective stakeholders’ engagement.

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