The Recovery and Sustainability of the Baltic Sea
Large Marine Ecosystem


Jan Thulin
International Council for the Exploration of the Sea
Copenhagen, Denmark



The Baltic Sea Large Marine Ecosystem (BSLME) is a unique and productive
ecosystem under stress from harmful and unsustainable human activities and
practices. Efforts are now gaining momentum to enhance cooperation between
the riparian countries and the main international institutions involved in the
science, advice and management of the marine environment including the
region's fisheries, with a view to the recovery of the Baltic Sea Large Marine
Ecosystem (BSLME) and the sustainability of socioeconomic benefits for the
coastal nations and their communities.


Main characteristics of the Baltic Sea Large Marine Ecosystem

Geologically, biologically and in human terms, the Baltic Sea LME is a young,
relatively shallow semi-enclosed sea. About 15,000 years ago, the thick ice belt
which then covered the whole of Scandinavia started melting and a fresh water
Baltic ice lake was established. During the following 9,000 years, this water area
developed into a wholly marine area, then, once more, into an enclosed fresh
water area before it again developed into a marine area, about 6,000 years ago.
At its present state of development, the Baltic Sea's marine life is less than 4,000
years old.

Today, the Baltic Sea LME is a semi-enclosed brackish water area, the second
largest in the world after the Black Sea, with a surface area of about 415,000
km2. The average depth of the Baltic Sea is around 50 meters. The deepest
waters are in the Landsort Deep in the Baltic proper, where depths of 459 meters
have been recorded. More than 200 rivers empty into the Baltic Sea, providing a
catchment or drainage area of about 1,700,00 km2, that is approximately four
times larger than the Baltic Sea itself. This catchment area is viewed as a
component of the Baltic Sea LME, as it is now recognized that natural (e.g.
precipitation and floods) and anthropogenic (e.g. pollution) effects occurring in
the land-based watershed result in impacts on the living resources of the Baltic
Sea LME.

The Baltic Sea is characterized by a persistent vertical stratification of its water
layers, with a residence (turn-over) time for full exchange of its water mass


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estimated at 30 years. These features are major factors that increase the
susceptibility of the Baltic Sea to accumulate pollutants.



Figure 1. The Baltic Sea LME catchment area (outlined in dark red).


The Baltic Sea comprises three deep basins separated by shallow sills: the
Arkona Deep, at the entrance to the Baltic Sea, the Bornholm Deep, and the
Gotland Deep, farthest inwards. Saltier, heavier and oxygen-rich water from the
North Sea enters the Baltic Sea through the shallow, narrow entrance and
propagates along the deeper regions, while a counter current of freshwater flows
outwards at the surface. This results, throughout most of the ecosystem, in two
vertically stratified parts of the water column, which rarely mix. This stratification
significantly limits the passage of oxygen from the surface into the deeper waters.
The inflows of oxygen-rich water are of vital importance for the well-being and
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productivity of the biota and determine the environmental quality of the Baltic Sea
LME. Unfortunately, these inflows causing flushing of the Baltic Sea are
unpredictable and infrequent, with periods of stagnation between flushing events
that last as long as several decades, such that oxygen levels decline over time
between each inflow due to the biological oxygen demands of living organisms
and the breakdown of organic material. Although the influxes are basically
random and connected with climatic variability that is not due to human
influences, it appears that these influxes since the second half of the 20th century
are decreasing in both frequency and magnitude.

Because of its history and brackish environment, the Baltic Sea LME is
characterized by the low number and biodiversity of plant and animal species
than in more saline waters. The brackish water is too salty for most freshwater
species and too fresh for most marine species. For example, the number of
macroscopic and microscopic animal species west of Sweden is roughly 1,500;
in the southern Baltic there are only about 150 species, and in the water around
Gotland only about 80 species. The same applies to fish: the Kattegat has
around 100 marine fish species, while the Sound has only 55 and the
Archipelago Sea only about 20. Other fish species are representative of those
normally found in freshwater lakes and rivers all over the region, so that a single
catch in the Bothnian Bay might consist of a unique combination of cod, herring,
perch, and pike. The salinity gradient is paralleled by a climatic gradient with up
to six months of ice cover, a productive season of 4-5 months in the northern Gulf
of Bothnia, and an 8-9 month productive season in the southern sounds near its
entrance. Besides these variations in biodiversity, it is typical that the few
species penetrating into brackish waters are typically slower growing and of
smaller size than in their original habitats, irrespective of whether their original
habitats are marine or freshwater. Thus, the Baltic Sea environment and its
biological diversity are unique. Its associated biota is facing a special challenge
in living under a difficult natural environment that is particularly vulnerable to
pollution and other human-caused stresses.

Despite the limited number of species, the structure and functioning of the
BSLME is not simple. Typically, energy flows in shorter or longer food chains of
up to a maximum of about five trophic levels, from the primary production
originating from plants living in the sea and coastal areas, via grazing by
herbivorous animals (e.g. zooplankton), and successive levels of predation to the
higher level predators such as fish, seabirds and shorebirds, and marine
mammals. Besides this typical `grazing' food chain, we also have a microbial
food chain that is longer and accordingly less efficient but no less important. The
whole picture is complicated by important multispecies interactions, e.g. predator-
prey relationships, interlinking the various food chains into a food web. The
abundance of species and the structure and function of the food webs and
ecosystems vary as a result of changing environmental conditions and human
impacts.



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Since the 1940s, the accelerated industrialization and exploitation of natural
resources in the Baltic Sea have resulted in the deterioration and degradation of
this vulnerable marine ecosystem. Today, close to 90 million people inhabit the
Baltic Sea drainage basin, and their activities impact and change the Baltic Sea
environment. The Baltic Sea LME is among the most scientifically investigated
sea areas in the world. Its environmental conditions, the possible impacts of
human activities and the major threats to the ecosystem have been known and
well documented for a long time. The key environmental issues and threats to
the Baltic Sea ecosystem are: eutrophication, overfishing, chemical pollution,
changes in biodiversity and, especially in recent years, climate change.


International Management and Advisory Systems

In the Baltic Sea LME, fisheries management (e.g. the setting of total allowable
catches and quotas) was conducted between 1973 and 2005 by the International
Baltic Sea Fishery Commission (IBSFC), situated in Warsaw, Poland. In 2004,
with the accession to the European Union (EU) of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and
Poland, the EU, via the European Commission, and Russia began managing
Baltic Sea fisheries. The management of environmental issues (e.g. pollution
and biodiversity conservation) is conducted by the Helsinki Commission­Baltic
Marine Environment Protection Commission (HELCOM), in Helsinki, Finland).
The Contracting Parties of these commissions are the 8 Baltic EU countries
(Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Sweden),
and the Russian Federation. These management bodies receive the best
available and politically neutral scientific information and advice for regulatory
purposes from the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES),
situated in Copenhagen, Denmark. ICES utilizes a consensus-based peer-
reviewed advisory process with national representation. Fundamental inputs are
the annually compiled reports of its numerous oceanographic, environmental and
fisheries working groups that address key practical tasks as required. HELCOM
and the European Commission together with their member states use the ICES
advice to make management decisions. However, they are not obliged to act in
accordance with the advice provided to them.

In response to calls from stakeholders in the fisheries sector who wanted to be
more involved in fisheries management, the EU in 2006 created the Baltic Sea
Regional Advisory Council (BS RAC) in Copenhagen, Denmark. Similar advisory
councils have been established in six other EU regions. The main aim of the BS
RAC is to prepare and provide stakeholder advice on the management of Baltic
Sea fisheries in order to support the implementation of the EU's Common
Fisheries Policy. The BS RAC meets frequently with ICES for cooperation and
mutual updates on fisheries and science-based activities.

The last two decades have seen considerable political and socioeconomic
changes in the Baltic Sea area. A major change was the collapse of the Soviet
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Union in 1991 and disappearance of the "iron curtain" which separated the
people of the eastern Baltic from the richer western countries. This resulted in
the re-establishment of the three Baltic republics of Estonia, Latvia, and
Lithuania, the reunion of East and West Germany, and, as mentioned earlier, the
accession to the European Union of the Baltic Republics and of Poland. This led
to improved communication and cooperation both in science, management and
societal issues among the nine Baltic Sea countries. However, the countries in
transition are still hampered, mainly for economic reasons, in meeting scientific
standards and fulfilling their obligations to the managing bodies of the Baltic Sea.
The transboundary nature of threats to the BSLME requires the coordinated
actions of all riparian countries for their solution.


The Baltic Sea Regional Project

In the late 1990s, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Russia, requested the
funding support of the Global Environment Facility (GEF) and western Baltic
countries to participate in coordinated actions to establish the sustainable
management of the Baltic Sea LME's natural resources.

After several years of preparation, the Baltic Sea Regional Project (BSRP) was
launched in 2003 and continued through the first phase until July 2007. The
main aim of Phase one of the BSRP was to create conditions for the application
of the ecosystem approach in managing the Baltic Sea Large Marine ecosystem
and sustaining its biological productivity. The BSRP was coordinated, monitored
and evaluated by HELCOM (Executing Agency) and ICES in collaboration with
the IBSFC (dissolved in January 2006), and with the Swedish Agriculture
University (SLU) in Uppsala, Sweden. The GEF and World Bank provided a
grant of $5.5 million to support the project. Other co-financing was provided by
Denmark, Finland, Germany, Norway, Sweden, the United States (NOAA), the
World Wildlife Fund (WWF), and the Nordic Environment Finance Corporation
(NEFCO) increased the total budget to $16 million. Thirty partner institutions in
the beneficiary countries and about 10 institutions in the donor countries were
involved in the BSRP which had an overall staff of over 70 people during the first
phase.

The BSRP and its two main components, the LME activities and the land and
coastal activities, were based on the Large Marine Ecosystem concept launched
by Dr. Kenneth Sherman in the US. The LME concept advances activities and
assessments of key environmental issues within 5 modules: (1) Productivity, (2)
Fish and Fisheries, (3) Pollution and Ecosystem Health, (4) Socioeconomics, and
(5) Governance. The BSRP working structure (Figure 2) was built in accordance
with this 5-modular system through the establishment of Coordination Centers for
each of the 5 modules and with activities reported from designated Lead
Laboratories (LL).



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Over the years the BSRP has produced over 3,000 pages of scientific and public
outreach reports and made about 150 power point presentations. It is considered
a major key player in strategies and actions to improve the status of the Baltic
Sea environment. The following is a brief review of some of the key problems
and threats to the Baltic Sea LME, and some of the BSRP activities and solutions
to cope with them.

Working Structure
CC: Coordination Centre
LL: Lead Laboratory
LIU: Local Implem. unit
Coordinators, C1, C2
CC
LIU and C
LIU and CC
LIU and CC
LIU and CC
Ecosystem
Fisheries
Productivity
GIS & Data
Socio-economy
Health
Riga
Riga
Vilnius
Tallinn
Gdynia
LL
LL
LL
LL
LL
Fish
Alien
CES surveys
Coastal
Phytoplankton
LL
Diseases
Species
Kaliningrad
Activities
Monitoring
Zooplankton
Tallinn
Kaliningrad
Klaipeda
SOOP
Gdynia
Tallinn
LL
LL
LL
Fish age/
Salmon
Co-LPM
Biodiversity
Co-LPM
Co-LPM
Stomach anal.
Restoration
SOOP
St. Petersburg
MMED
CZM
Riga
Riga
Tallinn
+ Institutes in Denmark, Finland, Germany, Sweden and USA


Figure 2. The working structure of the Baltic Sea Regional Project (BSRP), with Coordination
Centers, Lead Laboratories and Local Implementation Units in different countries adjacent to the
Baltic Sea LME.



Productivity and Ecosystem Health

Eutrophication, or nutrient over-enrichment, is the biggest problem facing the
Baltic Sea. Increasing amounts of nutrients in the marine environment result in
increased plant biomass and production, which in turn lead to elevated amounts
of organic matter circulating in the ecosystem. The excess organic matter
requires more oxygen, both when it is alive and when it is decaying. In the Baltic
Sea LME, which experiences only rare major flushing events, eutrophication
frequently leads to serious oxygen depletion and the formation of toxic hydrogen
sulphide in the deeper regions. This has resulted in so-called dead bottom
areas, nearly devoid of typical benthic animals and bottom living fish, covering
nearly a third of the bottom area of the Baltic Sea LME. The input of nutrients to
the Baltic Sea has increased greatly since about the 1940s, with nitrogen and
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phosphorous rising by about three to five times the 1940s level. The most
important human-related source of these nutrients in the Baltic Sea is agriculture,
where farmers use excessive manure and artificial fertilizers for the production of
their crops, and the surplus runs into the sea via streams and rivers. This is
especially true for the eastern Baltic countries, i.e. the BSRP recipient countries.
Additionally, the situation is exacerbated by changes in land use and the loss of
wetlands, as well as by the discharge of sewage from urban and industrial
sources. Other complicating environmental factors affecting eutrophication
trends are increased temperatures due to climate change in the Baltic Sea area.

Plankton production often gives rise to harmful blooms such as the potentially
toxic blue-green cyanobacteria blooms in the summer that can be seen from
satellite imagery. These excessive blooms of plant material and associated
decay cause major problems by reducing water quality through oxygen deficiency
and increased turbidity. This makes it difficult to meet bathing water standards
on the beaches. Thus, eutrophication is often associated with declining
recreational and tourist amenities. Furthermore, increased levels of nutrients
lead to the loss of rare species and habitats that are adapted to low nutrient
levels.

Due to the major impact of agriculture on eutrophication in the Baltic, the BSRP
component "Land and Coastal activities, C2" concentrated its efforts on
increasing awareness in the agricultural sector on environmentally sustainable
farm management practices. For this purpose, a series of seminars was held in
all rural districts of the beneficiary countries and the seminars were attended by
approximately 1,200 farmers. Furthermore, economic support and subsidized
loans were given to follow the results. In addition these BSRP activities included
the establishment of a system for monitoring and assessment of non-point source
pollution originating from farms. In cooperation with WWF, the BSRP C2
intensively promoted community based coastal zone management activities by
holding training and awareness activities in more than 120 schools for about
16,000 pupils. The BSRP further performed a series of demonstration activities
including work in rivers to restore crayfish and trout habitats, and restoration of
over 300 hectares of coastal wetlands/meadows in the three Baltic republics.

The BSRP Coordination Center of Productivity (CCPROD) together with its Lead
Laboratories (LLs) (Figure 2) have performed a number of major and innovative
activities to improve cooperation and assessment of productivity parameters.
Soon after its establishment, the CCPROD integrated environmental aspects and
productivity into fisheries assessments. This was one significant step that
improved the sustainable management of Baltic Sea fisheries. The CCPROD
also tested and implemented ECOPATH modeling for comparative productivity
analysis, and improved zooplankton modeling by methodological inter-
comparisons. These activities and the results thereof were discussed and
considered in projects and working groups at both HELCOM and ICES. In
collaboration with the Algaline project at the Finnish Institute of Marine Research,


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and with the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI), the
BSRP established a contract with the Stena Line, the owner of the passenger
ferry Stena Nordica, for this ferry to be used as a Ship of Opportunity (SOOP) on
the route from Karlskrona, Sweden to Gdynia, Poland. This aimed to extend
existing spatial and temporal sampling of SOOP vessels to the Southern Baltic
east of Bornholm, a key area for the Baltic cod stock. The new route is now
contributing to the re-establishment of lower trophic level productivity
assessments, including pelagic autotrophs, phytobenthos and zooplankton, and
is improving the data needed to develop spring bloom and other relevant indices.

For several decades many toxic substances have been known to threaten the
Baltic Sea environment. This includes heavy metals, persistent organic
pollutants (POPs), oil pollution, artificial radionuclides and dumped munitions.
Many of the heavy metals and POPs can become magnified in the higher levels
of the food chain. Halogenated hydrocarbons such as polychlorinated biphenyl
congeners (PCBs), the pesticides DDT, Lindane, their metabolites and isomers,
and unintentional by-products of combustion processes, are classed as
xenobiotics, i.e. unknown to the environment before their human production.
Most are accumulated in the fatty tissues of organisms, and many are harmful
even at low concentrations. The PCBs and DDT are toxic substances that
became well known and frightening to the public around the Baltic Sea in the late
1960s and 1970s. At that time, the Baltic grey seal population decreased
considerably and it was discovered that up to 80% of their females were sterile,
mainly due to total or partial obstruction of the uterine tubes (Bergman and
Olsson, 1985). It was thought that the main reason was the high concentrations
of PCBs and DDT in their tissues. At that time the presence of these pollutants in
guillemots and white eagles were also correlated to their decrease in populations.
After international measures were implemented in the late 1970s to reduce and
ban the input of PCBs and DDT, concentrations decreased in body tissues for all
three species mentioned and their populations have steadily increased. The
DDT and PCB problem in the Baltic has successfully been addressed through
legislation and governance. Since the implementation of the 1988 HELCOM
Ministerial Declaration, the load of hazardous substances to the Baltic Sea has
diminished by 20-50%. However, there are many hundreds of potentially
hazardous chemicals emitted to the Baltic Sea and some new contaminants have
been recently reported for the area that may create future environmental
problems. These are endocrine disrupting chemicals, polybrominated flame
retardants (PBBs and PBDEs), complex chlorinated chemicals from pulp and
paper mills, and dioxins that accumulate in fatty fish such as herring and sprat.

With the establishment of a BSRP ICES Study Group on Baltic Ecosystem Health
Issues (SGEH), the concept of Ecosystem Health was introduced into the Baltic
Sea science community and into the work of ICES and HELCOM. The SGEH
became instrumental in linking conventions, stakeholders and science. In the
application of the ecosystem approach for the management of the Baltic Sea,
ecological quality objectives (EcoQOs) were developed. This became a key
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issue for the CCEH and its three lead laboratories. Since such indicators had
been developed and applied earlier by the US Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) in the Great Lakes, the EPA was invited and a highly qualified person
participated in the whole process. The work resulted in a list of indicators to be
used in assessments of the Baltic Sea LME. The indicators will likely be used in
HELCOM's thematic assessments on biodiversity, hazardous substances, and
monitoring of biological effects of harmful substances.

New alien species appearing in the Baltic Sea have been the responsibility of the
Lead Laboratory (LL) for Alien species. In the last 150 years, with accelerating
speed over the last two decades, the Baltic Sea has received over 100 alien
species, several of which may cause biodiversity loss and adverse
environmental, economic and social impacts. Most of them have been
transported and released into the Baltic Sea by ships, especially tankers
releasing their ballast water. The best known alien fish species in the Baltic is
the Ponto-Caspian round goby, Neogobius melanostomus. This 25 cm long,
edible fish was first observed in the Gulf of Gdask in 1990. Today it is
distributed all along the southern and eastern part of the Baltic Sea where its
aggressive and territorial behavior dominates the habitat (Almqvist 2008). Its
successful reproductive and opportunistic behavior makes it a threat to native fish
species and their habitats. A recent invader to the Baltic Sea also represents a
major threat to the ecosystem: the American comb jelly Mneiopsis leidyi. It was
found for the first time in the southern Baltic in the Fall of 2006 and in the
northern Baltic in 2007. Its abundance in August 2008 was 40-60% higher than
in August 2007, thus indicating an adaptation to Baltic Sea conditions (Letiniemi
2008).


Fish and Fisheries

The commercially most important fish species in the open Baltic Sea are cod,
herring, sprat and Baltic salmon. The total annual catch of these fish stocks has
increased 10-fold during the past 50 years. Until the 1930s, catches remained at
about 120,000 tonnes, then increased to about 500,000 tonnes in the late 1950s
and, after a steep rise in the mid 1960s, reached almost a million tonnes by the
end of the 1970s. In the last 20-30 years however, overfishing and the failure of
fisheries management to maintain sustainable fisheries and conserve commercial
fish stocks have become increasingly more pronounced. Nearly all commercially
important fish stocks have been severely depleted and have been outside of safe
biological limits due to decades of unsustainable fishing effort resulting from
excessive fishing capacity and inappropriate fishing practices. Cod is the most
important fish in the Baltic. From a maximum annual catch of cod in the mid
1980s of nearly 450,000 tonnes, the nominal catch steadily declined by 1992 to
about 50,000 tonnes and has hovered around 100,000 tonnes since then (Figure
3).


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Landings in Baltic Sea LME


Figure 3. Fish landings in the Baltic Sea. Herring and cod are the most important fish species.
From the SeaAroundUs Project at www.seaaroundus.org.


As a result of management failures due to the managing agencies setting cod
total allowable catches (TACs) that have frequently exceeded the levels advised
by ICES, the stock size of Baltic Sea cod reached its lowest level on record in
1991. Levels since then and up to 2007 have been close to this historic
minimum. Overfishing of larger fish-eating fish, e.g. cod, has allowed increased
industrial fishing of sprat and herring. The economic yield per unit biomass of the
fishery has declined, with a smaller proportion of the catch being directed for
human consumption and food security. Unsustainable fishing has also caused
further impacts on marine ecosystems through by-catch and the discarding of
fish, and on bottom living animals, seabirds and marine mammals. Bottom
trawling has degraded vulnerable habitats. This has had a negative impact on
ecosystem structure and function. Fisheries enforcement has been ineffective
against bad fishing practices. Catch statistics misreport landings outside legal
channels to the detriment of official statistics on catches and landings, the
exceeding of quotas, fishing in closed areas and unacceptable discards. Where
regional international regulatory commissions have agreed on remedial actions,
there has often been a lack of political will at the national level to fully implement
agreed actions to restore depleted fish stocks and protect marine ecosystems.

However, in the last two years, public awareness of the Baltic and its fish and
fisheries, especially cod, has grown considerably in most of the Baltic riparian
countries. The media has dealt in detail with the failure of the Common Fisheries
Policy, and in Sweden, for example, the publication of the book "Tyst Hav" (Silent
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Sea) which in a popular way deals with the political, biological and economical
issues of Baltic fisheries, received a strong reaction from the public (Lovin 2007).
As a result, people started to boycott cod, fish dealers stopped selling cod,
restaurants stopped serving it, and NGOs red-listed many Baltic Sea fish
species. In Poland, fishermen and fisheries officials admitted to the heavy
overfishing of TACs and high frequency of illegal fishing. Baltic Sea managers
had long been aware of the situation and had already prepared a recovery plan
for the Baltic cod. For the first time in years, ICES made a statement about the
eastern Baltic cod population in 2008 indicating that "an increase in spawning
stock biomass has been observed since 2005 although it is still at a historical low
level." ICES in 2008 classified the stock as being harvested sustainably (ICES
2008).

In 2003, the BSRP coordinator stated in an interview that "Baltic fisheries have to
get rid of the Klondyke mentality and stop overfishing." He referred to a possible
30-50 percent gap between reported and real amounts of fish caught in the Baltic
Sea (Baltic Times 2003). From the very start of the BSRP, the Coordination
Center for Fish and Fisheries (CCFF) has been engaged in the improvement of
fish stock assessments, data reporting and advisories. It has improved
commercial fish stock assessments by extending survey areas into northern and
coastal parts of the Baltic and by initiating joint surveys. It has improved on the
quality of fish stock assessment data by coupling bottom trawling with pelagic
acoustic surveys of the stocks and by harmonizing fish growth and feeding
analysis methodology. The CCFF was also able to improve landing statistics by
upgrading the biological data collection from commercial catches. In a series of
workshops, the BSRP Lead Laboratory (LL) for Coastal Fish has acted as co-
chair and has cooperated with HELCOM, ICES and the Swedish National Board
of Fisheries to improve the coastal fish monitoring programmes around the Baltic
Sea with an aim to contribute to overall assessments of the Baltic Sea LME.


Present and Future

In recent years and paralleling the activities of the BSRP a series of management
and science activities, crucial for the future of the BSLME, have been initiated. A
European Maritime Policy and a Marine Strategy have been developed by the
European Commission for the Baltic Sea, considered as one of three European
regional seas. For each regional sea the Marine Strategy calls on the parties to:
(1) Assess the current environment status; (2) Define good ecological status; (3)
Establish environmental targets and indicators; (4) Develop monitoring
programs; and (5) Achieve good environmental status by 2020. For this activity,
HELCOM has developed a Baltic Sea Action Plan (BSAP) which was adopted by
the contracting parties at the end of 2007. The plan aims "to safeguard the
Baltic's natural ecosystem while allowing valuable marine resources to be used
sustainably in the future." The action plan is based on the ecosystem approach
and is in a broad sense using the LME approach of the BSRP. In fact, the BSRP


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has been instrumental in the preparation of the action plan. For example, the
plan will be based on Ecological Quality Objectives and indicators. The key
issues prioritized for actions in the BSAP are eutrophication, hazardous
substances, maritime activities, and biodiversity.

To address future needs for scientific advice ICES has produced a science plan
built on the ecosystem approach, which integrates fisheries and environmental
issues. One BSRP group that has been a driving force in this work of integration
and in bridging ICES and HELCOM activities is the WG on Integrated
assessment in the Baltic (WGIAB). ). ICES has also been re-organized from
thematic advisory committees to a single Science committee and a single
Advisory Committee, both supported by expert groups.

Through the BSRP and its LME activities, ICES has become involved in an EU
project called "Baltic Sea Science­a Network of Science Agencies" (BONUS). In
2005, this project was charged by the EU to produce a Baltic Sea science plan
and implementation strategy. The task to accomplish this was given to BSRP/
ICES. This plan will convert research needs arising from management agencies
into scientific questions to which the Baltic Sea science community can respond
with research ideas. The Baltic Sea Science Plan is written in accordance with
the LME concept and contains all its major elements (Figure 4) (Hopkins et al.
2006). In September 2007, the BONUS science plan called for project proposals.
In June 2008, 16 projects were granted money for three years with a total budget
of 22 million Euros.

THEME 7
Integrating
Ecosystem
and society
THEME 2
THEME 6
Understanding
Preventing
climate
change &
pollution
THEME 1
Geophysical
Linking
forcing
Science
& policy
THEME 5
THEME 3
Predicting
Combatting
biodiversity
eutrophication
THEME 4
Achieving
Sustainable
fisheries


Figure 4. Illustration of the Baltic Sea Science Plan of the BONUS project.
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To summarize the ecological and management status of the Baltic Sea Large
Marine Ecosystem, we can state that it looks much brighter and more hopeful
today than it did five years ago. There is public awareness of its environmental
issues and a political will to improve and care for the marine environment and its
resources.

BSRP activities were recently evaluated (ICR 2008) and it may be relevant to
quote the last paragraph on lessons learned: "The lessons of the project have
been incorporated into the BSAP, BONUS +, and other programs whereby they
will inform improved management of the Baltic environment in the future."
Through these initiatives, the Baltic Sea LME is also providing a pioneering
example for implementation of the new EU Marine Strategy Directive, as well as
global commitments made under the convention on Biological Diversity, The
World Summit on sustainable Development and the Rio Declaration. Although
the BSRP was officially completed in 2007, its spirit is still in the area, its network
is still up and running and its footprint is clearly visible.


References

Almqvist, Gustaf. 2008. Round goby Neogobius melanostomus in the Baltic Sea ­ Invasion
Biology in practice. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:su:diva-7450 (2008-12- 02).
The Baltic Times. 2003. Overfishing devastating Baltic Sea Ecosystem. The Baltic Times,
October 2, 2003. 1p.
Bergman A. and Olsson M. 1985. Pathology of Baltic grey seal and ringed seal females with
special reference to adrenocortical hyperplasia: Is environmental pollution the cause of a
widely distributed disease syndrome? Finn Game Res 44:47-62.
Bergman, A., and Olsson, M. (1989). Pathology of Baltic grey seal and ringed seal males. Report
regarding animals sampled 1977­1985. In: Influence of Human Activities on the Baltic
Ecosystem. Proceeding of the Soviet-Swedish Symposium "Effects of Toxic Substances
on Dynamics of Seal Populations," Moscow, USSR, April 14­18. (A. V. Yablokov and M.
Olsson, Eds.), pp. 74­86. Leningrad Gidrometeoizdat.
Fonselius, S.H. and J. Valderrama. 2003. One hundred years of hydrographic measurements in
the Baltic Sea. J. Sea Res. 49:229-241.
Hopkins, C.C.E., J. Thulin, JG Sutinen, K. Kononen, P. Snoeijs, S. Johansson & HO Nallbach.
2006. BONUS-169 Baltic Sea Science Plan and Implementation Strategy. BONUS
Publication No. 5. 59p.
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