The Western Channel Observatory (WCO) is an oceanographic time-series and marine biodiversity reference site in the Western English Channel. In situ measurements are undertaken weekly at coastal station L4 and fortnightly at open shelf station E1 using the research vessels of the Plymouth Marine Laboratory and the Marine Biological Association. These measurements are complemented by PML's recognised excellence in ecosystem modelling and satellite remote sensing science. By integrating these different observational disciplines we can begin to disentangle the complexity of the marine ecosystem. The WCO measures several key parameters important to the functioning of the marine ecosystem such as light, temperature, salinity and nutrients. Station L4 has some of the longest time-series in the world for zooplankton and phytoplankton, and fish trawls have been made by the MBA for a century. Station E1 has a hydrographic series dating from 1903. These long series are complemented by hourly measurements made at our moorings situated at both stations. These can elucidate changes not captured by the routine weekly sampling.

Several climate indices, regarding Atlantic Basin: - North Atlantic Oscillation - Southern Oscillation Index - Bivariate ENSO Timeseries - Tropical Northern Atlantic Index - Tropical Southern Atlantic Index - Oceanic Niño Index - Multivariate ENSO Index (MEI V2) - North Tropical Atlantic SST Index - ENSO precipitation index - Northeast Brazil Rainfall Anomaly - Solar Flux (10.7cm) - Global Mean Lan/Ocean Temperature

GBIF, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, is an international network and data infrastructure funded by the world's governments and aimed at providing anyone, anywhere, open access to data about all types of life on Earth. Coordinated through its Secretariat in Copenhagen, the GBIF network of participating countries and organizations, working through participant nodes, provides data-holding institutions around the world with common standards and open-source tools that enable them to share information about where and when species have been recorded. This knowledge derives from many sources, including everything from museum specimens collected in the 18th and 19th century to geotagged smartphone photos shared by amateur naturalists in recent days and weeks. The GBIF network draws all these sources together through the use of data standards, such as Darwin Core, which forms the basis for the bulk of GBIF.org's index of hundreds of millions of species occurrence records. Publishers provide open access to their datasets using machine-readable Creative Commons licence designations, allowing scientists, researchers and others to apply the data in hundreds of peer-reviewed publications and policy papers each year. Many of these analyses, which cover topics from the impacts of climate change and the spread of invasive and alien pests to priorities for conservation and protected areas, food security and human health, would not be possible without this. GBIF arose from a 1999 recommendation by the Biodiversity Informatics Subgroup of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's Megascience Forum. This report concluded that "An international mechanism is needed to make biodiversity data and information accessible worldwide", arguing that this mechanism could produce many economic and social benefits and enable sustainable development by providing sound scientific evidence.

NCAR was established by the National Science Foundation in 1960 to provide the university community with world-class facilities and services that were beyond the reach of any individual institution. More than a half-century later, we are still delivering on that mission. NCAR provides the atmospheric and related Earth system science community with state-of-the-art resources, including supercomputers, research aircraft, sophisticated computer models, and extensive data sets. From its founding, NCAR was meant to provide the atmospheric research community with the shared resources necessary to work on the most important scientific problems of the day. Not much has changed. The hundreds of scientists who work here research all things atmospheric — which includes everything from the microphysics of cloud formation and the chemistry of air pollution to large-scale planetary waves and the impact of increased greenhouse gases on our climate. Since the atmosphere interacts with everything it touches, its crucial to investigate those interactions, too.

NASA's Physical Oceanography Distributed Active Archive Center (PO.DAAC) is located at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. PO.DAAC manages and provides tools and services for NASA's oceanographic and hydrologic data (satellite, airborne, and in-situ) to enable a greater understanding of the physical processes and conditions of the global ocean. Measurements include gravity, ocean winds, sea surface temperature, ocean surface topography, sea surface salinity, and circulation. The data support a wide range of applications including climate research, weather prediction, resource management, policy, and the stewardship of ocean data resources.

Accredited through the MEDIN partnership, and core-funded by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Scottish Government, DASSH provides tools and services for the long-term curation, management and publication of marine species and habitats data, within the UK and internationally. Below are a selection of projects, outputs and deliverables that DASSH and the MBA Data Team have been involved in recently. - NE Data Management: DASSH have been contracted by the Marine team at Natural England (NE) to support NE data dissemination. We have been digitising datasets used in Article 17 reporting and helping them input data to Marine Recorder and MEDIN guidelines. In addition, DASSH is running a 2-day workshop with the marine data team in October 2014 on data management and standards. The aims of the workshop are to present MEDIN data guidelines and standards and to run practicals on quality assurance (QA) issues with data, creating MEDIN formatted data, and creation of MEDIN metadata. - MCZ Data Archiving: DASSH staff have been working with Defra, JNCC, Natural England, Cefas and the other MEDIN DAC's in the development and implementation of a strategy for the archiving and dissemination of MCZ survey data. This involves the archives of many terrabytes of data from the survey work undertaken at 127 sites. DASSH is currently working with the other DACs archiving the data from several MCZ sites before taking delivery of the complete survey catalogue. - Non-Natives Data Management: DASSH staff work with other members of the KE team to help deliver the MBA contribution to the GB Non-native Species Information Portal. The data team ensure the validation of records submitted and raise alerts when records of Invasive Non-Native Species of concern and in disseminating information about species distribution via DASSH and the NBN. DASSH staff continue to liaise with organisations to ensure the prompt flow of marine non-native species distribution data to the public domain. The KE team facilitated the identification of two new marine invasive non-native species in 2014 and have subsequently created the identification sheet for these species. Hemigrapsus sanguineus (from volunteer records sent in for identification) and Hemigrapsus takanoi (first recorded by the John Bishop Group survey team). - EMODNet Biology: The Data Team are part of a consortium led by the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) for the biological data component of EMODNet (European Marine Observation and Data Network). The Data Team will lead a work package relating to biological traits and indicator species as identified for Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) reporting, bringing an additional €130k of funding. - VALMER: The Data Team led a key work package in a £3.7 million (ca. €260k for the MBA) INTERREG project to "Develop, trial and refine methodologies that will be used to quantify and communicate the value (economical, social and environmental) of marine and coastal ecosystem services". The research identified an operational framework to value marine ecosystem services, and which could be used to enhance marine planning and policy decisions.

Stakeholder networks from 32 countries united to collaborate on Ocean Action, Climate Action, addressing pollution from land-based, riverine and marine-based sources and advancing Circular Economy development. International Waste Platform provides international expertise and launches joint initiatives; It supports advancing solutions to mitigate the global waste, plastic pollution & climate crises which are interlinked. Representatives committed themselves to align objectives, to support the implementation of strategies of Ocean Action and Climate Action, as well as to share ideas, best practices, concepts, programs, knowledge and opportunities; including the reduction of plastic debris at the source, before it enters rivers and the coastal environment. Country / regional networks and national marine debris networks make a difference in societal behaviour change and environmental policies by providing input and promoting action which aims at finding solutions to reduce (ocean) plastic pollution. Country and regional networks are instrumental to reach the prevention and reduction of marine pollution, facilitate and foster the establishment of national and international partnerships in a multi-stakeholder approach.

EMODnet Biology provides three keys services and products to users. 1)The data download toolbox allows users to explore available datasets searching by source, geographical area, and/or time period. Datasets can be narrowed down using a taxonomic criteria, whether by species group (e.g. benthos, fish, algae, pigments) or by both scientific and common name. 2) The data catalogue is the easiest way to access nearly 1000 datasets available through EMODnet Biology. Datasets can be filtered by multiple parameters via the advanced search from taxon, to institute, to geographic region. Each of the resulting datasets then links to a detailed fact sheet containing a link to original data provider, recommended citation, policy and other relevant information. Data Products - EMODnet Biology combines different data from datasets with overlapping geographic scope and produces dynamic maps of selected species abundance. The first products are already available and they focus on species whose data records are most complete and span for a longer term.

The Ocean Action Hub is an open, interactive website providing information and promoting action globally to support the implementation of SDG 14: Life below Water before 2030. The Hub was initiated by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), in partnership with the Governments of Sweden and Fiji, to facilitate multistakeholder engagement as part of the Ocean Conference process. The Hub hosted online discussions on ocean issues as an input into the development of the 1st Ocean Conference "Call for Action" in 2017, and facilitated co-development of solutions and voluntary commitments by multi-stakeholders, as well as providing a space for connecting and sharing ideas. In the run-up to the 2nd Ocean Conference the Hub continues to be maintained as a central source for information on implementation of SDG 14. The ocean plays a key role in the achievement of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The ocean covers nearly three quarters of the Earth’s surface and contributes substantially to human development, including to the provision of food security, transport, energy supply, tourism and many of the planet’s most critical ecosystem services (carbon and nutrient cycling, climate regulation, oxygen production). The market value of marine and coastal resources and industries is approximately USD 3 trillion per year, or 5 percent of global GDP. Yet, today it is estimated that 40 per cent of our oceans are heavily affected by unsustainable practices, including over-fishing, land-based sources of pollution, habitat destruction, invasive species and climate change, particularly ocean acidification. SDG 14: Life below Water aims to address these threats.

EMODnet (European Marine Observation and Data Network) is the long term marine data initiative supported by the European Commission since 2009 to ensure that European marine data will become easily accessible, interoperable, and free on restrictions on use. EMODnet Chemistry provides access to standardized, harmonized and validated chemical data collections for water quality evaluation at a regional scale, as defined by the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). The data portal has adopted and adapted SeaDataNet standards and services, establishing interoperability between the data sets from the many different providers (more than 60 in EMODnet Chemistry network). Concentration maps of nutrients, chlorophyll-a and dissolved oxygen are computed on a standard grid, providing information at a regular time interval, per season and over several vertical layers, including the deepest one. Dedicated OGC standard services for browsing, viewing and downloading chemistry observation, data and data products for the European waters have been developed, and are actively maintained and monitored.