MSFD - Technical Group on Marine Litter Progress and future work 21.06.2016 MSFD WG GES European Commission Joint Research Centre G. Hanke http://mcc.jrc.ec.europa.eu/

MSFD - Technical Group on Marine Litter Progress and future work 21.06.2016 MSFD WG GES European Commission Joint Research Centre G. Hanke http://mcc.jrc.ec.europa.eu/

TG Marine Litter Mandate 2016-2018 MSFD CIS Document (MD2016-1-3) Adjusted mandate for descriptor specific work Additional requests: TG ML to play key role in development + implementation of possibly revised GES Decision and Annex III (ongoing) Program of measures External dimension Need to ensure resource allocation!

TG Marine Litter Annual meeting 6.-7.4.2016, Palermo, Italy 25 participants MS delegates, Stakeholder, Research representatives DG ENV, EEA present OSPAR, HELCOM, MAP present Meeting report available on CIRCABC

Regional Sea Conventions Three Regional Sea Conventions (HELCOM, OSPAR, Barcelona) have developed Regional Action Plans on marine litter. For the Black Sea, work on an Action Plan has started. Joint Black Sea Commission + EMBLAS II Marine Litter workshop, 13.-14.4.2016 (Istanbul, Turkey), all BS countries present, EMBLAS II (DG NEAR), input based on TG ML TG ML Mandate: Can act as a platform to exchange knowledge and experiences for these regional seas action plans and to support their implementation across EU.

Marine Litter Research DG R+I provided input on COLUMBUS + upcoming calls JPI OCEANS – 4 projects started PERSEUS - ended Defishgear – ongoing/ending RIMMEL - started …. List of most relevant projects is being established on MCC (D10, Science for MSFD) TG ML Mandate: TG litter expected to become a hub for knowledge sharing, disseminating and using the information from research and other marine litter projects

Marine Litter monitoring related projects: EEA Litterwatch - EU (and beyond beach litter) monitoring Surfrider - NGO approach for watershed litter assessments Litterbase - Research data collection tool

TG ML Thematic Reports Identifying sources of marine litter Final draft Harm caused by marine litter Monitoring of riverine litter Advanced draft Modelling of marine litter Outline and draft text Reports on CIRCABC for WG GES information

Monitoring methodologies and protocols Further development of less mature approaches Methods for Beach, Seafloor, Floating Litter, Entanglement, Ingestion Providing protocols instead of initial guidance Collaboration with JPI Oceans (micro litter) Review and update of Master Category List

EU external dimension of marine litter G7 activities Monitoring meeting January 2016 (Tokyo), the 4 EU countries provided coordinated TG ML based input UN Environmental Assembly Meeting on 23-27 May 2016 Further work planned, need to inform and align Sustainable development goal 14 “Life below water” RIO +20 Mandate of TG ML: TG Litter will, to the extent possible, take into account international developments

Baselines roadmap 2016-2017 Mandate by MDs Review of baselines setting approaches (litter and other topics) Review of data availability and quality Dedicated workshop (end 2016) Discussion and agreement on approach Testing on selected datasets Thresholds Start of basic discussions

RIMMEL RIverine and Marine floating macro litter - Monitoring and Modelling of Environmental Loading MCC RIMMEL observation network Observation network across Europe (and beyond) Visual observation of river surface, documentation and data transfer via app MS are invited to join! Contact: rimmel@jrc.ec.europa.eu

Next steps Finalize outstanding commitments Adapt to new mandate, ensure resource allocation Plan, prioritize, organize and start work in TG ML 2016-2017

Thank you for your attention !