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Displaying items by tag: Irish marine researchers

Irish marine researchers (including SMEs) are invited to comment and / or give input to future European Marine Research Strategy via the draft Ostend Declaration.

The EurOCEAN 2010 Ostend Declaration will be a key deliverable of the Belgian-EU Presidency EurOCEAN 2010 Conference (Ostend 12th – 13th October). The Ostend Declaration, following the success of the Galway Declaration (2004) and the Aberdeen Declaration (2007), is intended to highlight the importance of marine and maritime science and technology for our economies and societies and to identify the high level governance structures, support mechanisms and research infrastructures necessary to ensure that critical research challenges in the next decade are properly addressed at national and European level.

In consultation with key European marine and maritime science stakeholder organisations and networks, a drafting group has prepared a draft Ostend Declaration which will be open for consultation until 4th October 2010. The Declaration aims to raise the profile of marine science and technology in Europe and needs your support.

The draft Ostend Declaration will be presented and discussed for approval at the EurOCEAN 2010 Conference on 12th – 13th October 2010 (www.eurocean2010.eu) which will be attended by Commissioner Damanaki (DG MARE) and Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn (DG Research).

Published in Marine Science

Coastal Notes Coastal Notes covers a broad spectrum of stories, events and developments in which some can be quirky and local in nature, while other stories are of national importance and are on-going, but whatever they are about, they need to be told.

Stories can be diverse and they can be influential, albeit some are more subtle than others in nature, while other events can be immediately felt. No more so felt, is firstly to those living along the coastal rim and rural isolated communities. Here the impact poses is increased to those directly linked with the sea, where daily lives are made from earning an income ashore and within coastal waters.

The topics in Coastal Notes can also be about the rare finding of sea-life creatures, a historic shipwreck lost to the passage of time and which has yet many a secret to tell. A trawler's net caught hauling more than fish but cannon balls dating to the Napoleonic era.

Also focusing the attention of Coastal Notes, are the maritime museums which are of national importance to maintaining access and knowledge of historical exhibits for future generations.

Equally to keep an eye on the present day, with activities of existing and planned projects in the pipeline from the wind and wave renewables sector and those of the energy exploration industry.

In addition Coastal Notes has many more angles to cover, be it the weekend boat leisure user taking a sedate cruise off a long straight beach on the coast beach and making a friend with a feathered companion along the way.

In complete contrast is to those who harvest the sea, using small boats based in harbours where infrastructure and safety poses an issue, before they set off to ply their trade at the foot of our highest sea cliffs along the rugged wild western seaboard.

It's all there, as Coastal Notes tells the stories that are arguably as varied to the environment from which they came from and indeed which shape people's interaction with the surrounding environment that is the natural world and our relationship with the sea.