Joint Cluster Event Restore & Protect Marine Biodiversity and Reducing ByCatch

The European Research Executive Agency (REA) hosted the cluster event in Brussels on March 13 and 14, 2025. The meeting was organized by the European Commission (DG RTD, DG Mare, DG Env & Rea), BioAgora, Eklipse, HIFMB and B-Useful. Cristina Gambi on behalf of REDRESS was invited to be part of the knowledge exchange network for marine biodiversity. More than 50 people attended belonging to the invited project coordinators, members of the EU DG and Rea and other external observers. The objectives of this Cluster of EC funded projects are to

1. bring together representatives of the selected H2020 and Horizon Europe funded projects focusing on the topic of the restoration and protection of marine and coastal biodiversity and reducing bycatch;
2. join and be part of the topical reactive network of the Marine Demonstration case for the Science Service for Biodiversity and support the identification of policy needs and bridging of knowledge gaps, and
3. discuss how actions will take place in the future to maximize the impact of the selected projects on EU policies and feed the European biodiversity knowledge framework.

The meeting provided an important overview of the potential synergies and common areas of work and to facilitate the exchanges between the projects, policy-makers and other relevant initiatives in marine ecosystems, fostering the sharing of knowledge, planning for any future knowledge exchange mechanism, legacy and impact of each project and the cluster. The cluster is under the umbrella of BioAgora (https://bioagora.eu/). BioAgora is a five-year EU-funded project aiming to support sustainable transformation for biodiversity in Europe. It aims to connect research on biodiversity to the needs of policy making via a dialogue between scientists, other knowledge holders and policy actors. BioAgora is using demonstration cases to address science-based transformative changes and key needs of the EU’s Biodiversity Strategy for 2030. The cluster fully supports the aims of the EU Mission Restore our Ocean and Waters, the Marine Action plan, the Nature Restoration Law and the European Biodiversity Strategy 2030, and other ocean-related initiatives, facilitating the integration of approaches, tools, knowledge and experience from different HE projects involving ecologists, economists, and practitioners in conservation, restoration and government. The multidisciplinary aims of REDRESS can benefit from being part of this cluster to maximize the impact of the project results. Here is the link to the meeting agenda with the list of speakers.