MarSP Project had the pleasure to be a part of the European Maritime Day 2019 held on 16-17 of May in the beautiful city Lisbon, Portugal.

The EMD 2019 focused on blue entrepreneurship, research, innovation and investment to boost sustainable technologies and emerging value chains in the wider ocean economy, was the highly participated EMD yet.

On the 17^th of May, MarSP Project held the Stakeholders Workshop “Innovative Tools & Transferability in MSP Projects” which counted over than 140 participants. This workshop aimed to launch a joint discussion between MSP projects about the use of innovative tools to improve the support of the implementation of the MSP Directive. More than 10 projects had the opportunity to identify and share tools & best practices applied or to be applied in their respective basin with the potential of transferability. The Workshop consisted of four dynamics: ‘Show Practical Solutions – EASME Sister Projects’, ‘Innovative Tools & Good Practices’, ‘Interactive Format’ e ‘Open Discussion’

In the 1st Dynamic, DG MARE, presented an overall perspective of the ongoing MSP projects, highlighting the importance of cooperation and synergies between them. In this session,  the Sisters EASME Projects  - PanBaltic Scope, Ocean Métiss, SEANSE e MarSP, were presented.

Then, in ‘flash’ format, a 3-minute presented, several projects, actors and initiatives, as European MSP Platform, IOC-UNESCO e MSP Global, CPRM, etc., shared the current MSP tools and best practices.

The 3rd Session followed in a more dynamic and interactive format. The participants had the chance to intervein and give their feedback to the question set in the Sli.do platform.  

Main Results of the Workshop

Overall, the Word Cloud provided the topics that were highlighted by the audience during the workshop, being the main topic selected – MSP.

Sli.do – Question polls
Under the set of the three launched questions, it was gathered 189 inputs from the audience, which means that an average of 63% of the persons in the audience has voted for each question.

1st Question: Which perspective has a higher impact on MSP Implementation?
With the total input of 67 people, the audience voted the Stakeholder Engagement presented by the Pan Baltic Scope Project has the perspective with the highest impact on MSP implementation. The second most voted perspective was the International Initiative from the MSP Global, followed by the EMODNET perspective Mapping Human Activities.

2nd Question: Which tool is more innovative and transferable?

With the total input of 62 people, the audience votes have reflected a tie between two tools. The audience considered both the Stakeholder Engagement by the Pan Baltic Scope Project and the Mapping Human Activites by EMODNET has equally innovative and transferable.

3rd Question: In one word, state the next challenge for MSP?

With the input of 60 people, the audience considered that the major future challenge for MSP is the Implementation of the MSP processes. The Cooperation, Communication, Climate Change, and Governance were also highlighted as the next challenges for the MSP.

Sli.do – Audience open questions
Throughout the Workshop, the audience had the opportunity to submit their open questions, trough the Sli.do platform to be discussed later. This session was very active, being submitted 15 questions, which gathered 118 likes in total .

Since the workshop time was limited, it was impossible to discuss all the 15 submitted open questions. The moderator selected the most voted questions, and these were discussed between the speakers and the audience in the workshop .

1. Are you considering climate change impacts on MSP? And how? – 19 likes
2. all) Have you map/list your ecosystem services and take them into account some how in your MSP process? – 15 likes
3. Beyond the capability building, anyone knows successful experiences on awareness (less technical & more strategic) to the decision makers (politicians) about MSP? – 12 likes
4. Following all MSs adopting Marine Spatial Plans, what steps will be taken at a European level to ensure plans are used and continually updated & relevant? – 10 likes
5. Unlike land planning, MSP currently does not have a mature legal framework attached to it, e.g. case law. How might this evolve & how might MSP practice change? – 10 likes 
6. Are data and information contained in the various portals, projects communicated back to - and scrutinised by - Stakeholders? How? – 8 likes 
7. Is the economic valuation of ecosystem services based on preferences (stakeholders/experts/public) being used to inform MSP? Do you recognize its potential? – 8 likes
8. How have you bridged the gap between technical-scientific conclusions of your projects and the agenda and priorities of public policy processes? – 8 likes
9. What are some ways to track and quantify equitability in MSP? – 5 likes
10. Supporting MSP implementation - is it better to target many orgs that make lots of small-scale decisions or fewer large orgs that may make few large-scale ones? – 4 likes 
11. Re: CEAF - why this new framework when we already have SEA and EIA Directives? What are the key differences? – 4 likes
12. Is EMODNET data about human activities includes the identification of companies and business and its spatial distribution in the coastal and marine area? – 4 likes
13. Are you aware of a decision made on a marine activity being challenged on the basis of how a marine spatial plan has been used in making the decision? – 3 likes
14. Who should write MSP data harmonization guidelines to ensure interoperability beyond INSPIRE? – 3 likes
15. Is the data of human activities been used for making environmental policy at NUTS III nivel in Europe? If not, how do you think this can be implemented? – 2 likes