1. Summary of Member States Initial Assessment
Summary of Member States Initial Assessment
WG ESA meeting in Bonn October 2011
Elisabet Kock and Katrin Zimmer, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and Mats Ivarsson, Swedish Agency for marine and Water Management
During the WG-ESA meeting in Paris last spring it was decided that one work program activities was to make a summary of the MS work with the initial assessment. SE volunteered to lead this work and to present it at the 6th WG-ESA meeting, which turned out to be here in Bonn.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

2. Summary of Member States Initial Assessment
Summary of Member States Initial Assessment
Questionnaire sent out in June 2011 to all WG ESA members
12 countries replied (France, Sweden, Germany, Finland, Estonia, UK, Slovenia, Spain, Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium and Malta)
Questionnaire divided into five parts:
Links between article 8 and other parts of MSFD
Planification and working methods
Approach for assessing use of marine waters
Methodologies in BAU
Approach in estimating cost of degradation
As the basis for the summary a questionnaire was prepared and sent out to all MS and also to the Regional Seas convention. The fact that the working group is open to anyone resulted in participation also from NO, CRO, EEA and a number of stakeholder organisations.
12 countries active in the WG-ESA replied.
The summary is divided into 5 parts
The IA shall serve as the foundation to other parts of the MSFD, for example the program of measures and the monitoring program. The first section aims to capture how different MS have coped with these complexities.
The second part deals with how the MS plan their work with the IA and which working methods that are beeing used
The third part focus on the first part of article 8.1(c), and what approaches different MS has used in the analysis of the use of waters and how the linkages are made to other parts of art 8.
The fourth part serve to illustrate the methods used by MS in the development of BAU scenarios and to what extent they could be considered to be comparable between MS.
The last part focus on the second part of art 8.1(c), the cost of degradation of the marine environment, and the approaches used by the MS and how benefits are planned to be described.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

3. 1. Links between article 8 and other parts of MSFD
1. Links between article 8 and other parts of MSFD
All MS coordinate with work done in article 8.1. a, b and c, seven MS with art. 9 and 10.
Coordination done either by one person in charge of coordination or through regular coordination meetings.
Three MS are already preparing programmes of measures; SW, UK and NL. All MS will however use IA as a base for elaborating the programme of measures.
All MS link art 8 a,b and c, seven MS also link the IA to art 9 and 10.
Coordination is done either by one person in charge of coordination or by regular coordination meetings.
Several countries underline the importance of linking main pressures and economic sectors.
Three MS ar already preparing programs of measures, SW, UK and NL, but all MS state that they will use the IA as a base for elaborating their programs of measures.
Several MS also state the role of the IA in identifying the GAP between GES and the BAU scenarios and the cost of degradation for which the program of measures will be designed adress.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

4. 2. Planning of work and methods used
2. Planning of work and methods used
Timescale
All MS will finish or have a first draft of IA during autumn 2011
DPSIR framework
Majority of MS will follow
Special heading on social analysis
Four MS
Data use
Official data (two MS)
Expert opinions (six MS)
Transboundary issues
All MS will coordinate work with other MS, majority with RSC
Approach used for assessing Use of Marine Waters
Majority will use marine Water Accounts Approach
Three MS will use Ecosystem approach
The second part deals how the MS have planned their work and what approaches and methods they have chosen.
Timescale; All MS are planning to finnish their assessment or have a first draft ready this fall. After that the public consultation processes are planned to begin. For example Germany plan to start their public consultation in October 2012 and Sweden in january 2012.
DPSIR; In the WG-ESA guidance document the DPSIR framework was presented as a framework to follow in the initial assessment. Eleven MS answered that they will follow the framework in their analysis. Most MS will use it in a strict sense and a few in a modified way according to data availability.
Social analysis; In the WG-ESA guidance document it was agreed upon that social analysis was included in the kind of economic analysis involved here. However four MS state that they will have a separate heading for the social analysis in order to highlight this aspect, and six MS will not. A elewenth MS state that they prefere not to use a separate heading.
Data use; Two MS will only use official data and rest will also use other sources of information when needed.
Two MS will when no data is available or is deficient leave the area with no comment to be handled during the next cycle, Six MS will use expert opinions.
Two MS will describe those issues qualitatively and one MS also adds that they will specify the information gaps in order to be solved in the next applying steps of the MSFD.
Three MS state that their analyses will be mostly quantitative. The others believe that the part covering the use of the seas will be mainly quantitative but the part on cost of degradation more qualitative or that the conclusions will be qualitative but a lot of the underpinning analysis will be quantitative.
Transboundary issues; All MS will coordinate work with other MS, the majority through RSC. Apart from that most countries have bi- or multilateral contacts and the work in WG-ESA is of course another form of coordination.
Use of marine waters; When it comes to the use of marine waters, the majority of the MS have chosen the marine Water accounts approach. Three MS have chosen the ESS approach which goes a step further when identifying benefits.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

5. 3. Analysed sectors in the Use of Marine waters
3. Analysed sectors in the Use of Marine waters
This table shows how many countries that has taken these 13 sectors into account in their analysis of the use of the marine waters. The sectors or activities ”Storage”, of for example CO2, and ”Water abstraction” has been taken out of this presentation (2 and 1 MS respektively) stated that they had used these sectors. 6 MS stated that they had used ”other” sectors than the ones in listed in the table.
With regards to linking of b and c in art 8 in the MSFD, seven MS plan to link sectors to pressures and impact, and three plan to link pressures and impacts with drivers.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

6. 4. Business as Usual Nine MS will make a BAU
4. Business as Usual
Nine MS will make a BAU
All nine aim to use the time perspective 2020
Majority will do one scenario for each sector.
Other MS will choose alternative ways, for example one scenario for each descriptor
Consideration of other policies into MSFD – still varying degree and large uncertainty
When it comes to the development of Business as usual scenarios the MS have stated the following;
Nine MS…..
All nine….and several will also have sceanrios with longer time perspectives.
The Majority….but for example Estonia will do scenarios for descriptors, at least eutrophication,
UK will do a scenario report on priority pressures/sectors and on each descriptor and Finland will make scenarios for those sectors or features of the sea where models are available (eutrophication and possibly fish).
There is still large uncertainties when it comes to considering other policies into the MSFD and it will be done to varying degrees i different MS.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

7. 5. Cost of Degradation Large spread of used methdologies: Approach
5. Cost of Degradation
Large spread of used methdologies:
Approach
Member States
Ecosystem services approach
Denmark, UK
Cost-based approach
Netherland, Spain
Thematic approach
France, Germany, Belgium
Mix of approaches
Sweden, Estonia
Others
Slovenia, Finland, Malta
When it comes to approaches used to assess the cost of degradation Denmark and UK have chosen the ESS approach….
Slovenia will do an ecosystem services list and try to outline the major effects of predicted changes of marine environment.
Finland state that the COD equals the benefits foregone and that the costs of activities to meet the decided state will be used as a first approximation if valuation data is not yet available before spring next year.
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

8. 5. Cont. Cost of degradation
5. Cont. Cost of degradation
Assessment of costs
Four MS use costs for current measures
Six MS use cost of non-action
Two not decided yet
Assessment of benefits
Majority of MS will use qualitative assessment
Three MS use a mixture of approaches
Two MS will perform new WTP studies
The reponses show that there are different views on how to handle the difficulty of assesssing the COD. One way is to use current costs, another is to have a more forward looking approach.
Four MS ….as a minimum COD.
Six MS…..as beeing equal to lost benefits in the future.
Two has not yet decided.
However, comments show that even if you think that cost of non-action is equal to benefits lost in the future, the cost of measures to reach good status by 2020 can be a used as a rough measure of a minimum COD. Other MS states that the COD includes both current cost for measures to prevent environmental degradation as well as benefits foregone in the future due to environmental degradation.
Assessment of benefits
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency

9. Thank you! Questions or Elisabet.kock@swedishepa.se
Thank you!
Questions or
Naturvårdsverket | Swedish Environmental Protection Agency