Many Cystoseira species have specific ecological requirements, and as such restoration actions have the highest probability of success if they are undertaken in areas where Cystoseira is/was recorded.

Furthermore, the geographical distribution and key drivers and abiotic variables that influence the distribution of Cystoseira species are still unknown. This knowledge is crucial to understand ecological and evolutionary processes, and in managing direct and indirect anthropogenic changes.

The WP1 activities aggregate information relating to the key pressures and stakeholders in the region which will provide critical contextual information to prioritise areas for future restoration initiatives.

This will result in a map that can be used to identify degraded Cystoseira meadows in the Mediterranean Sea that are suitable for restoration. Special attention will be given to areas with a high potential to provide a wide range of marine ecosystem services (e.g., Marine Protected Areas, areas where pressures have been reduced but ecosystems have not returned to a healthy state).

This WP has two objectives:

• the collection of historical and current data required to produce fine-scale distribution maps of Cystoseira species and identify patterns and trends;
• the supplementation of this information with relevant contextual information, for example, cumulative impacts map for the Mediterranean Sea (Micheli et al. 2014, Abdul Malak et al. 2015, local refinements during AFRIMED project) to select, by means of spatial analysis, priority areas in the Mediterranean deserving restoration actions.

Co-leaders: Partner 6, HAO “DEMETER” Fisheries Research Institute (Satirios Orfanidis) and Partner 10, Faculty of Sciences of Bizerte, University of Carthage (Amel Hannachi)