Download or read book Marine Ecosystem Assessment for the Southern Ocean: Meeting the Challenge for Conserving Earth Ecosystems in the Long Term written by Monica M. C. Muelbert and published by Frontiers Media SA. This book was released on 2024-12-24 with total page 537 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: National and international agencies need assessments of change in ecosystems and their drivers in order to sustain natural systems, to maintain the delivery of services, and to meet the challenge for conserving Earth ecosystems in the long term. In marine systems, change may arise directly from human activities (e.g. fisheries), indirectly from local or global activities (cascading effects through food webs from fisheries or changing environments from climate change and/or ocean acidification), or from naturally varying processes. A particular challenge for managers is to identify how dangerous future climate change will be for ecosystems and their services and whether mitigation or adaptation may be needed, in advance, in order to achieve the conservation requirements. For regions of international attention, particularly those that have the attention of many management or policy-oriented bodies, a standardized process is needed to harmonize the scientific information on the status and trends in ecosystems used by the different bodies. That process also needs to ensure the information is available in a timely manner. For example, assessments of change in habitats, species and/or food webs in the Southern Ocean are currently compiled separately for at least ten different international organizations or processes. A Marine Ecosystem Assessment for the Southern Ocean (MEASO) aims to harmonize that information for policy-makers. This assessment began with an international conference in April 2018 (http://www.measo2018.aq/), where it was agreed to undertake the first MEASO over 2018-2019 with the view to provide the outcomes to relevant bodies, such as the Scientific Committee for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources, soon after.