EcoScope

18/08/2026

🏆 🌊 🐟 We’re proud to share that EcoScope has received a Platinum Facilitation Impact Awards, the highest category awarded by the International Association of Facilitators (IAF).

The EU-funded EcoScope Project aimed to promote an effective and efficient ecosystem-based approach to fisheries management. It developed an interoperable platform, a robust decision-making toolbox, a series of online courses, and a mobile application. These tools were made available through a single public portal to support efficient, ecosystem-based fisheries management and enable maximum, continuous stakeholder participation.

The IAF Facilitation Impact Awards honour organisations that have achieved a positive, measurable impact using facilitation, and Platinum Awards are given when exceptional, transformative impact has happened. This recognition celebrates the collaborative approach and measurable impact behind EcoScope’s work.

🏆 Yesterday we were awarded a Platinum Facilitation Impact Award - the highest category of award possible - from the International Association of Facilitators - IAF for the workshops we conducted under the Horizon 2020 funded EcoScope project.

🎣 The EcoScope project, which ran from 2021-2025, aimed at developing a series of e-tools to promote effective ecosystem-based fisheries management. We organised two workshops, in collaboration with professional facilitator Elisabeth (Lizzie) Crudgington and EcoScope consortium members, which aimed at improving usability of the tools by co-designing them with participants and making them fit-for-purpose, as well as to increase trust in the tools by eliminating the "black box" perception. Surveys with participants after the two workshop showed that we successfully achieved both objectives. The IAF Facilitation Impact Awards honour organisations that have achieved a positive, measurable impact using facilitation and Platinum Awards are given if exceptional, transformative impact happened. We have had the pleasure of working with Lizzie on a number of projects and activities, including on the ongoing SURIMI Project.

🔗 Find out more about EMB's role in EcoScope here: https://marineboard.eu/ecoscope
More about the Facilitation Impact Awards here: https://iaf-world.org/fia/

28/06/2026

🏆 Yesterday we were awarded a Platinum Facilitation Impact Award - the highest category of award possible - from the International Association of Facilitators - IAF for the workshops we conducted under the Horizon 2020 funded EcoScope project.

🎣 The EcoScope project, which ran from 2021-2025, aimed at developing a series of e-tools to promote effective ecosystem-based fisheries management. We organised two workshops, in collaboration with professional facilitator Elisabeth (Lizzie) Crudgington and EcoScope consortium members, which aimed at improving usability of the tools by co-designing them with participants and making them fit-for-purpose, as well as to increase trust in the tools by eliminating the "black box" perception. Surveys with participants after the two workshop showed that we successfully achieved both objectives. The IAF Facilitation Impact Awards honour organisations that have achieved a positive, measurable impact using facilitation and Platinum Awards are given if exceptional, transformative impact happened. We have had the pleasure of working with Lizzie on a number of projects and activities, including on the ongoing SURIMI Project.

🔗 Find out more about EMB's role in EcoScope here: https://marineboard.eu/ecoscope
More about the Facilitation Impact Awards here: https://iaf-world.org/fia/

13/05/2026

📢 EMB Annual Report 2025

📙 Our EMB Annual Report 2025 is now published! Read it to find out all about our busy year, including:

- Our Working Groups and publications
- The 9th co-hosted by Institut des Sciences naturelles - Instituut voor Natuurwetenschappen
- The EMBCP CommOcean Online talks event
- The EcoScope, BRIDGE Black Sea, IPOS (International Platform for Ocean Sustainability), RHE-MEDiation project, BAMBOO Project, and SURIMI Projects
- Our support for the Missionoceanwaters and the UN Ocean Decade, including the programme

and much more!

🔗You can read it here:
https://www.marineboard.eu/publications/emb-annual-report-2025

📸 Karim Illya / Kogia

16/02/2026

16/02/2026

📘 For the EcoScope project we published a Policy Brief on "Citizens' views and preferences for Ecosystem-Based Fisheries Management"

🎣 This publication, based on research by Marie Briguglio and her team from University of Malta, highlighted citizen's broad support for these principles even if the term "Ecosystems-based Fisheries Management" is not widely known.

🔗 You can find out more about this work here: https://www.marineboard.eu/publications/citizens-views-and-preferences-ecosystem-based-fisheries-management

21/12/2025

Power your conservation work with FishBase and SeaLifeBase! 🌍🐟 Register for EcoScope Academy 👉 ecoscope.getlearnworlds.com

03/12/2025

The UBC Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries Micro-certificate in Analytics for Leaders in Ocean Management is a part-time online program which enables students to build their analytics knowledge and create solutions for sustainable-equitable development and management of Blue Economy conservation...

03/12/2025

Call for Abstracts: Submit your research for a session on ocean acidification at the World Conference on Marine Biodiversity 2026 (Bruges, Belgium, 17-20 November 2026)

Ocean acidification is progressing rapidly, yet its ecosystem- and biodiversity-level consequences remain insufficiently understood. The session "Minimizing the Impact of Ocean Acidification on Marine Biodiversity" will bring together researchers working on ocean acidification and experts in marine biodiversity assessment to discuss current knowledge, emerging techniques, and strategies to evaluate and minimize ocean acidification impacts.

This call welcomes contributions from laboratory, field, natural analogue, mesocosm, monitoring, modelling, and conceptual studies, as well as work using eDNA, omics, imaging, and traditional ecological knowledge. The goal is to build a multidisciplinary perspective on how ocean acidification affects biodiversity and how resilience can be supported under global change.

Topics include (but are not limited to):
• Ocean acidification impacts on species, communities, and ecosystems
• Biodiversity responses to multiple stressors
• Monitoring, observation systems, and long-term datasets
• eDNA, metagenomics, imaging, and emerging tools
• Modelling and predictive approaches
• Resilience, recovery, adaptation, and mitigation strategies

Join us in Bruges to strengthen the scientific foundation needed to understand and address the impacts of ocean acidification on marine biodiversity.

🗓️ Deadline: 17 March 2026
🔗 Find more information and submit your abstract here (select Session 1.4): https://ow.ly/zCI250XAGXP

01/12/2025