SESAME : About SESAME

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Project aims

The scientific objectives are developed into a number of specific goals, which concern: (a) Assessment, (b) Prediction and (c) Application.

More specifically, the scientific objectives are:

To assess changes in the SES ecosystems over the last 50 years.
To assess the current status of the SES ecosystems through analysis of existing and newly collected data, both at basin scale and through model simulations.
To predict changes in the SES ecosystems, using existing and new observations at a regional and basin scale in order to construct scenarios of the ecosystems' responses to changes in climate and anthropogenic pressures in the next five decades.
To assess and predict changes in the ability of the SES ecosystems to provide goods and services with potentially high societal importance, such as tourism, fisheries and ecosystem stability through conservation of biodiversity. SESAME identifies the ecosystem functions that are pertinent to these goods and services as well as their changes during the last decades.

Three specific goals, namely assessment, prediction and application, have been the determining factors for the development of SESAME's scientific objectives. With these goals in mind, SESAME aims to achieve the following:

Assessment

Identify the major changes and/or regime shifts and the natural and anthropogenic forcings responsible for these changes for the last 50 years. The project considers this period because it combines known changes and availability of sufficient data of the quality required to examine the potential responsible mechanisms.
Assess the current ecosystem status that represents an important landmark from which future evolution of the SES ecosystems.
Collect historical and current multidisciplinary datasets, including new observations, in order to analyse the signals of environmental changes in the past and validate the models.
Collect new information through multidisciplinary, multiship oceanographic cruises in the SES.

All the above provide an overall picture of the SES that does not exist as yet, as well as essential datasets for model validation.

Prediction

Use long-term (decadal) basin scale simulations and short-term regional scale simulations with coupled circulation-ecosystem models to predict the responses of SES ecosystems during the next five decades, based on consensus scenarios of changes in the forcings.
Validate models by hindcasting the past (50 years) marine ecosystem dynamics and their variability.
Validate and upgrade models using existing and new observations.
Choose a limited number of scenarios integrating qualitative stakeholder analysis and quantitative socioeconomic model outputs.
Predict ecosystem changes using the outputs of these scenarios to force the circulation-ecosystem model(s). The results are used to predict the effects of pressures on ecosystem functions (state), and the ability of ecosystems to sustain the above goods and services (impacts). The possible feedbacks of changes in impacts on policies (drivers) will also be explored.
Develop conceptual and mathematical tools to represent higher trophic levels (e.g. fish) in order to produce new management tools.

Application

Use quantitative socioeconomic models to consider the impact of ecosystem variability on human welfare.
Identify the ecosystem functions (observed and predicted from model simulations) that are pertinent to the selected goods and services as well as their changes during the last decades.
Carry out a scoping analysis to understand and evaluate key stakeholder perceptions referring to the future ability of SES marine environments.
Develop a sound methodological approach for integrating scientific modelling and socioeconomic analysis.
Transfer and/or adapt state-of-the-art analytical and policy tools to investigate the economic welfare implications of alternative development scenarios in the SES marine ecosystems.

A parallel objective is also to provide a platform for training, education and outreach in an integrated manner, which ensures that the scientific results will be translated to all levels of society.