Mediterranean and Black Sea fisheries feature a great variety of target species, vessels and fishing gears and play an important socioeconomic role in the whole region. The mandate of the General Fisheries Commission for the Mediterranean (GFCM) is to ensure the sustainability of fisheries activities through the adoption of adequate management measures. The assessment of the size and state of the stocks exploited by fisheries is one of the pillars of modern management. The GFCM as the responsible Regional Fisheries Management Organisations (RFMO) of the Mediterranean and Black Sea has established permanent working groups on dermersal and small pelagic fish species where fisheries scientists perform their analysis and provide the best scientific advice to better manage fisheries and fish stocks. The groups, in cooperation with regional programs under the Regional Sea Conventions, set standards and guidelines for the collection, transmission and analysis of these data.

Résumé

The Marine Reporting Units (MRUs) are used within the reporting obligations of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) in order to link the implementation of the different articles to specific marine areas. The MRUs can be of varying sizes, according to the appropriate scale for the different reports (e.g. region, sub-region, regional or sub-regional subdivision, Member State marine waters, WFD coastal waters, etc.), as indicated in the Good Environmental Status 2017 Decision. The present data set is the first public version released of the MRUs used during the first cycle of implementation of the MSFD (2012-2018) in all the reporting exercises (2012 reporting of Articles 8, 9 and 10; 2014 reporting of Article 11; and 2016 reporting of Articles 13 & 14). The data set is distributed in SHP and in INSPIRE-compliant GML format.

This vector data set is the first public version released of the EU marine waters used for the implementation of the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), submitted by the Member States to the European Commission. The Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) applies to all marine waters of EU Member States, which in Article 3 are defined as follows: (a) waters, the seabed and subsoil on the seaward side of the baseline from which the extent of territorial waters is measured extending to the outmost reach of the area where a Member State has and/or exercises jurisdictional rights, in accordance with the UNCLOS, with the exception of waters adjacent to the countries and territories mentioned in Annex II to the Treaty and the French Overseas Departments and Collectivities; and (b) coastal waters as defined by Directive 2000/60/EC, their seabed and their subsoil, in so far as particular aspects of the environmental status of the marine environment are not already addressed through that Directive or other Community legislation.

This dataset presents the resulting assessment grid (based on the EEA reference grid) with the classification of chemical status of the transitional, coastal and marine waters in the context of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). This classification has been performed using the CHASE+ tool, with classifications of the matrices ‘water’, ‘sediment’ and ‘biota’ and indicators of ‘biological effects’, as well as an integrated classification of chemical status, combining results of all matrices. The chemical status is evaluated in five classes, where NPAhigh and NPAgood are recognised as ‘non-problem areas’ and PAmoderate, PApoor and PAbad are recognised as ‘problem areas’. This is the assessment made excluding concentrations of mercury (Hg). The overall area of interest used is based on the marine regions and subregions under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Additionally, Norwegian (Barent Sea and Norwegian Sea) and Icelandic waters (’Iceland Sea’) have been added (see Surrounding seas of Europe). Note that within the North East Atlantic region only the subregions within EEZ boundaries (~200 nm) have been included. This dataset underpins the findings and cartographic representations published in the report "Contaminants in Europe's Seas" (EEA, 2019).

This data set presents the resulting assessment grid (based on the EEA reference grid) with the classification of chemical status of the transitional, coastal and marine waters in the context of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), providing a mapping of contamination 'problem areas' and 'non-problem areas' based on measurements of biological effects. This classification has been performed using the CHASE+ tool, with classifications of the of contaminant status of indicators of biological effects. The status is evaluated in five classes, where NPAhigh and NPAgood are recognised as ‘non-problem areas’ and PAmoderate, PApoor and PAbad are recognised as ‘problem areas’. Monitoring biological effects is restricted to a few indicators (e.g. imposex) and data coverage is currently limited. Biological effects have thus been addressed in only 134 assessment units, mostly in the Baltic Sea, the North Sea and the North-East Atlantic Ocean. This data set underpins the findings and cartographic representations published in the EEA report “Contaminants in Europe’s seas” (No 25/2018). See the mentioned report for further information.

This metadata refers to the EEA marine assessment grid, to which all data and assessment results have been spatially mapped in order to ensure that data can be compared in a uniform way across the European regional seas. The marine assessment grid is based on the EEA reference grid system. The EEA reference grid is based on ERTS89 Lambert Azimuthal Equal Area projection with parameters: latitude of origin 52° N, longitude of origin 10° E, false northing 3 210 000.0 m, false easting 4 321 000.0 m. All grid cells are named with a unique identifier containing information on grid cell size and the distance from origin in meters (easting and northing). An important attribute of the EEA reference grid system is that by using an equal area projection all grid cells are having the same area for the same grid size. In this marine assessment grid, two grid sizes are used: * 100 x 100 km in offshore areas (> 20 km from the coastline) * 20 x 20 km in coastal areas (<= 20 km from the coastline) The grid sizes were choosen after an evaluation of data availability versus the need for sufficient detail in the resulting assessment. The resulting assessment grid is a combination of two grid sizes using the EEA reference grid system. The overall area of interest used in the grid is based on the marine regions and subregions under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). Additionally, Norwegian (Barent Sea and Norwegian Sea) and Icelandic waters (’Iceland Sea’) have been added (see Surrounding seas of Europe). Note that, within the North East Atlantic region, only the subregions within EEZ boundaries (~200 nm) have been included.

The "EMODnet Digital Bathymetry (DTM) - 2016" is a multilayer bathymetric product for Europe’s sea basins covering:: • the Greater North Sea, including the Kattegat and stretches of water such as Fair Isle, Cromarty, Forth, Forties, Dover, Wight, and Portland • the English Channel and Celtic Seas • Western and Central Mediterranean Sea and Ionian Sea • Bay of Biscay, Iberian coast and North-East Atlantic • Adriatic Sea • Aegean - Levantine Sea (Eastern Mediterranean) • Azores - Madeira EEZ • Canary Islands • Baltic Sea • Black Sea • Norwegian – Icelandic seas The DTM is based upon more than 7700 bathymetric survey data sets and Composite DTMs that have been gathered from 27 data providers from 18 European countries and involving 169 data originators. The gathered survey data sets can be discovered and requested for access through the Common Data Index (CDI) data discovery and access service that also contains additional European survey data sets for global waters. This discovery service makes use of SeaDataNet standards and services and have been integrated in the EMODnet portal (https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/en/bathymetry#bathymetry-services ). The Composite DTMs are described using the Sextant Catalogue Service that makes also use of SeaDataNet standards and services. Their metadata can retrieved through interrogating the Source Reference map in the Central Map Viewing service (https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/geoviewer/ ). In addition, the EMODnet Map Viewer gives users wide functionality for viewing and downloading the EMODnet digital bathymetry such as: • water depth (refering to the Lowest Astronomical Tide Datum - LAT) in gridded form on a DTM grid of 1/8 * 1/8 arc minute of longitude and latitude (ca 230 * 230 meters) • option to view depth parameters of individual DTM cells and references to source data • option to download DTM in 16 tiles in different formats: EMO, EMO (without GEBCO data), ESRI ASCII, ESRI ASCII Mean Sea Level, XYZ, NetCDF (CF), RGB GeoTiff and SD • layer with a number of high resolution DTMs for coastal regions • layer with wrecks from the UKHO Wrecks database. The NetCDF (CF) DTM files are fit for use in a special 3D Viewer software package which is based on the existing open source NASA World Wind JSK application. It has been developed in the frame of the EU FP7 Geo-Seas project (another sibling of SeaDataNet for marine geological and geophysical data) and is freely available. The 3D viewer also supports the ingestion of WMS overlay maps. The SD files can also be used for 3D viewing by means of the freely available iView4De(Fledermaus) software. The original datasets themselves are not distributed but described in the metadata services, giving clear information about the background survey data used for the DTM, their access restrictions, originators and distributors and facilitating requests by users to originator.

The "EMODnet Digital Bathymetry (DTM) - 2016" is a multilayer bathymetric product for Europe’s sea basins covering:: • the Greater North Sea, including the Kattegat and stretches of water such as Fair Isle, Cromarty, Forth, Forties, Dover, Wight, and Portland • the English Channel and Celtic Seas • Western and Central Mediterranean Sea and Ionian Sea • Bay of Biscay, Iberian coast and North-East Atlantic • Adriatic Sea • Aegean - Levantine Sea (Eastern Mediterranean) • Azores - Madeira EEZ • Canary Islands • Baltic Sea • Black Sea • Norwegian – Icelandic seas The DTM is based upon more than 7700 bathymetric survey data sets and Composite DTMs that have been gathered from 27 data providers from 18 European countries and involving 169 data originators. The gathered survey data sets can be discovered and requested for access through the Common Data Index (CDI) data discovery and access service that also contains additional European survey data sets for global waters. The Composite DTMs can be discovered through the Sextant Catalogue service. Both discovery services make use of SeaDataNet standards and services and have been integrated in the EMODnet portal (https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/en/bathymetry#bathymetry-services ). In addition, the EMODnet Map Viewer (https://emodnet.ec.europa.eu/geoviewer/ ) gives users wide functionality for viewing and downloading the EMODnet digital bathymetry such as: • water depth (refering to the Lowest Astronomical Tide Datum - LAT) in gridded form on a DTM grid of 1/8 * 1/8 arc minute of longitude and latitude (ca 230 * 230 meters) • option to view depth parameters of individual DTM cells and references to source data • option to download DTM in 16 tiles in different formats: EMO, EMO (without GEBCO data), ESRI ASCII, ESRI ASCII Mean Sea Level, XYZ, NetCDF (CF), RGB GeoTiff and SD • layer with a number of high resolution DTMs for coastal regions • layer with wrecks from the UKHO Wrecks database. The NetCDF (CF) DTM files are fit for use in a special 3D Viewer software package which is based on the existing open source NASA World Wind JSK application. It has been developed in the frame of the EU FP7 Geo-Seas project (another sibling of SeaDataNet for marine geological and geophysical data) and is freely available. The 3D viewer also supports the ingestion of WMS overlay maps. The SD files can also be used for 3D viewing by means of the freely available iView4De(Fledermaus) software. The original datasets themselves are not distributed but described in the metadata services, giving clear information about the background survey data used for the DTM, their access restrictions, originators and distributors and facilitating requests by users to originator.

This data set presents the resulting assessment grid (based on the EEA reference grid) with the classification of chemical status of the transitional, coastal and marine waters in the context of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD), providing a mapping of contamination 'problem areas' and ‘non-problem areas’ based on measurements in the matrix "sediments". This classification has been performed using the CHASE+ tool, with classifications of the sediments matrix. The chemical status is evaluated in five classes, where NPAhigh and NPAgood are recognised as ‘non-problem areas’ and PAmoderate, PApoor and PAbad are recognised as ‘problem areas’. Most countries in Europe include marine sediments in long-term monitoring activities. Consequently, the data coverage is good, especially in southern parts of the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, the Celtic Sea, the Bay of Biscay, western parts of the Black Sea and the coastal waters of France, Italy and Portugal.The number of assessment units monitored and classified in the North-East Atlantic Ocean is 511. In the Mediterranean Sea, the number of assessment units is 153. Baltic Sea sediments are monitored on 97 assessment units while only 19 areas are assessed in the Black Sea. This data set underpins the findings and cartographic representations published in the EEA report “Contaminants in Europe’s seas” (No 25/2018). See the mentioned report for further information as well as examples of classification excluding specific groups of substances(e.g. metals, PBDEs).