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The Manifesto for building an effective Ocean Knowledge System presented at the European Parliament
29.03.2019
25 March 2019, Brussels, Belgium. The Ocean Dialogues 2019 event presented to the European Parliament a “Manifesto for building an effective Ocean Knowledge System” stressing the importance of open access, data sharing, science communication, ocean literacy, responsible research and innovation and co-creation through effective stakeholders’ engagement as key principles for the development of an effective Ocean Knowledge System.
The Manifesto also stressed the need to implement a “forward-looking vision” in building an Ocean Knowledge System that puts youth and Young Professionals at the center of its development process as users of knowledge, providers of knowledge and drivers for change.
Data sharing, ocean literacy and enabling platforms are also major assets for producing an inclusive Ocean science, with a view of leaving no one behind, according to the vision of the UN Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development (2021-2030), argued Mrs. Francesca Santoro, Programme Officer for Ocean Literacy at UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC).
The result of collaboration between two projects funded by the European Commission (EC) via the Horizon 2020 programme, MARINA and ResponSEAble. the Ocean Dialogues and the Manifesto were built with support from the EC’s DG RTD, the SEARICA Intergroup of the European Parliament, and UNESCO’s IOC.
“As policymakers, we should be more knowledge-driven than process driven. This means to focus more on what we can get from research while providing criteria to guarantee the credibility of the co-creation processes”, said Mr. Jacques Delsalle, Marine Environment and Water Industry, from the EC’s DG Environment.
Mr Marco Weidert (DG RTD) highlighted an urgent need for ocean education programs as well as for effective and inclusive engagement processes, while stressing that co-creation is a crosscutting dimension of the EU-funded research programmes. Also speaking on behalf of DG RTD, Ivan Conesa-Alcolea, further stressed the importance of connecting to existing platforms and communities in the field of Ocean Literacy so products, tools and initiatives developed by projects are made accessible.
Taking place after the main panels, Ocean Dialogues included a full-day Youth and Young Professionals workshop, where participants discussed ways to build scientists’ ability to effectively share results, not limited to the traditional “publication” process.
Capping the event, MEP and SEARICA President Mrs. Gesine Meissner highlighted that “Ocean governance is going to be crucial in the next years with regards to development and security issues in the entire globe.”
She concluded that “even if in the provisional agreement on Horizon Europe, the future EU research and innovation programme, the Ocean is not present enough, let’s be optimistic. The good news from those days is that Ocean Dialogues are in place and young people are so passionately taking care of the ocean”.
For any further information, please contact
Chiara Buongiovanni, APRE, Communication Officer: buongiovanni@apre.it
Fernando Ferri, MARINA Coordinator: fernando.ferri@irpps.cnr.it
Olga Mashkina, ResponSEAble Coordinator: o.mashkina@acteon-environment.eu
Francesca Santoro, Programme Specialist, IOC-UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe: f.santoro@unesco.org
On Twitter #OceanDialoguesManifesto
Disclaimer: the Manifesto for building an effective Ocean Knowledge System was drafted by Olga Mashkina, Saša Raicevich, Pierre Strosser and Francesca Ronchi based on results from the 2019 Ocean Dialogues, the co-creation joint event by MARINA and ResponSEAble Horizon 2020 funded projects. The Manifesto draft version is now available on the Ocean Dialogues official website (www.oceandialogues.eu/manifesto) and it will follow a review and input process before it is finalized and published.
This article has been slightly adapted from the source article published by MARINA: