 Restoring Mediterranean Fish stocks
3 June 2014, CIESM News
Scientists from FAO/ GFCM have assessed 34 fish stocks in the Mediterranean Sea. Their report, in the case of small pelagic stocks (sardines, anchovies), that 7 out of 9 stocks are overexploited ...
La France crée une zone économique exclusive en Méditerranée
15 November 2012, CIESM News
Par un décret publié le 14 octobre 2012, la France a créé une zone économique exclusive (ZEE) en Méditerranée qui se substitue à la zone de protection écologique créée en 2003 sur un périmètre identique ...
UN Secretary General launches the Oceans Compact Initiative
28 August 2012, CIESM News
In mid August United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon announced the launch of 'Oceans Compact', an initiative aiming to bring together all parts of the UN system in order to improve the coordination and effectiveness of its work towards the health of the oceans and enhanced marine knowledge and management ...
Towards joint UN / IWC protection cover for 76 highly migratory cetacean species?
9 July 2012, CIESM News
Participating, as special Envoy of the Prince of Monaco, to the 64th Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) that just ended in Panama, CIESM Director General - Dr Frédéric Briand - proposed a Resolution inviting the United Nations to place whale and dolphin conservation on the high sea 'under UN watch',...
Concern over atypical mass strandings of beaked whales in the Ionian Sea
20 April 2012, CIESM News
On 13 February the Scientific Committee of ACCOBAMS, led by CIESM independent scientists, expressed its highest concern over two atypical mass stranding events that took place in the Ionian Sea (in Greece and in Italy), and involving a minimum of 11 specimens of Cuvier’s beaked whales, Ziphius cavirostris ...
Italy declares an Ecological Protection Zone in its Ligurian, Tyrrhenian and Sardinian waters
2 April 2012, CIESM News
In the past decade a number of coutries bordering the Mediterranean Basin (Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Cyprus, Syria, Libya) did declare an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Recent developments, in France and in Italy, suggest that other countries will follow suite in the near term ...
Harmful Algae News turns 20, stays sharp!
February 2012, UNESCO News
Phytoplankton blooms, micro-algal blooms, toxic algae, red tides, or harmful algae: about 300 hundred species of micro algae are reported at times to form mass occurrence, known as blooms. Nearly one fourth of these species are known to produce toxins. The scientific community refers to these events with a generic term, ‘Harmful Algal Bloom’ (HAB) ...
Local ecological knowledge, a new tool to track signals of change in Mediterranean fish diversity
September 2011, CIESM News
One of the expected effects of global change is increased variability in the abundance and distribution of living organisms, but information at the appropriate temporal and geographical scales is often lacking to observe these patterns. That is why researcher sometimes are pushed to use alternative methods ...
Jelly blobs are alarm bells of our seas
6 July 2011 - CIESM News
The annual swarming of Rhopilema nomadica along the Levantine coastline began in early June and the swarm is larger, denser and composed of larger individuals than in previous years. Reports of stung bathers are common and seaside first aid stations have their hands full. Fisheries are impacted both short term ...
Japanese whalers stop their hunt in the Antarctic Ocean for the season
18 February 2011, adapted from AFP and the Sydney Morning Herald
Japanese whalers have stopped their Antarctic hunt, under heavy conservationist and diplomatic pressure, just half way through their worst ever season, citing harassment by environmentalists. Japan's Fisheries Minister Michihiko Kano announced today that Japan would halt its Antarctic whaling mission ...
The European Commission paves the way for unitary EU patent system
15 December 2010
The European Commission (EC) has given its backing to the creation of a single patent system within the EU that any member state can sign up to. The move is based on the ethos of 'enhanced co-operation', which means ratification of the law is not required by all member states ...
Latest review of the Mediterranean marine biodiversity - estimates, patterns and threats
5 August 2010, CIESM News
In a new study, just published in the online free journal PLoS ONE*, Marta Coll and 36 co-authors, experts of the Mediterranean Sea, have joined forces to update the estimates of how many marine species inhabit the Mediterranean Sea, using the information available in the published record and the opinion of experts ...
Two new studies point to world decline in phytoplankton biomass related to climate warming
5 August 2010, CIESM News
The first study by Michael Behrenfeld, of Oregon State University, USA, one of the world's leading experts in the use of remote sensing technology to examine ocean productivity has appeared in the journal Ecology. His findings challenge years of conventional wisdom about the growth of phytoplankton ...
Pacific Gray whale spotted in the Mediterranean Sea - Major puzzle for scientists
16 May 2010
May 2010. The recent sighting of a Gray whale off the coast of Israel has triggered great excitement, confusion and some head scratching amongst conservation experts as it either heralds the return of the North Atlantic Gray whale ...
Towards an International Ban on bluefin tuna trade
3 February 2010, adapted from the New York Times
European officials are increasing pressure for an international ban on the commercial fishing of bluefin tuna, a threatened species whose fatty belly is prized for sushi. But they are facing a delicate balancing act as they try to weigh economic interests of a Mediterranean fishing industry, a sushi-loving Japan, and a species that some experts say is on the verge of extinction ...
ICCAT takes decisive action to protect bluefin tuna and other marine species
11 November 2009
The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT) has met in Brazil and adopted a number of new multi-annual management plans which align fishing opportunities with the latest scientific opinions. Mediterranean nations can be particularly satisfied with the consensus ...
Come summer, come Rhopilema
Bella Galil, CIESM News, 10 June 2010
Each summer since the mid 1980s huge swarms of the Erythrean jellyfish Rhopilema nomadica have appeared along the Levantine coast in the last week of June or in early July. This year saw the arrival of the swarm quite earlier, in the first week on June ...
USA may ratify UNO Law of the Sea
15 May 2009
The UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) was concluded in 1982 and came into force ... 22 years later in 2004. At present, 157 countries are parties to the Convention. The USA figure among the 22 countries that have signed but have yet to ratify the Convention ...
Souveraineté disputée sur les fonds marins
12 mai 2009 - Adapté de Le Monde [Gaelle Dupont]
Depuis quelques jours, c'est l'embouteillage à la division des océans et du droit de la mer des Nations Unies. Argentine, Brésil, Côte d'Ivoire, France, Nigeria, Russie, Seychelles, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, ... la liste est longue: les Etats se précipitent pour déposer, avant la date butoir du 13 mai, leur demande d'extension des limites du plateau continental ...
Embargo de l'Union Européenne sur les importations de phoque
5 mai 2009
Le Parlement Européen a décidé de fermer ses marchés aux peaux et produits dérivés du mammifère. L'interdiction entrera en vigueur pour la prochaine campagne de chasse commerciale en 2010 ...
Nuclear reactor jeopardized by jellyfish
22 October 2008,
Reuters adapted from David Gregorio
Undesirable mass events of jellyfish are observed more and more frequently and are showing up even in places where they had rarely been seen before. Along with many, well-known undesirable side-effects of jellyfish swarms, these organisms can also clog the water-intake valves of coastal power plants’ reactors, jeopardizing effective cooling ...
Des éléphants de mer comme assistants océanographes en Antarctique
13 août 2008, Le Monde adapted from Pierre Le Hir
La recherche polaire s'est trouvé d'intrépides et infatigables auxiliaires : les éléphants de mer. Durant les hivers 2004 et 2005, sur quatre îles subantarctiques - Kerguelen (France), Géorgie du Sud (Royaume-Uni), Macquarie (Australie) et Shetland du Sud (Etats-Unis) -, 58 éléphants de mer ont été équipés de balises Argos ...
Refroidissement climatique lié à explosion de la biodiversité marine durant l'Ordovicien (- 480 Ma)
25 Juillet 2008, INSU Communiqué de Presse, adapted from Science
Un changement climatique global expliquerait l'explosion de la biodiversité marine il y a 460 Millions d'années. En effet, un refroidissement progressif des océans d'environ 15°C sur une période de 40 millions d'années au cours de l'Ordovicien vient d'être mis en évidence par des chercheurs de Lyon et de Canberra ...
Italy, France push to overturn tuna fishing ban
25 June 2008, European Voice
European Commission keeps ban in place, accusing France and Italy of under-reporting and overfishing.
A sometimes heated meeting of EU fisheries ministers ended yesterday with the European Commission insisting that a ban on the fishing of bluefin tuna would and should remain in place ...
Early closure by the EU of the Bluefin tuna fishery in the Mediterranean
13 June 2008, CIESM News
Regulation 530/2008, published today in the Official Journal of the European Union, announces the closure of the bluefin tuna fishery on June 16 for the purse seine fleets of France, Italy, Cyprus, Malta and Greece ...
Emptied Mediterranean - Sharks nearly gone
11 June 2008, New York Times, adapted from Andrew Revkin
Several ecologically-important shark populations in the Mediterranean Sea have completely collapsed, according to a new study, with numbers of five species now more than 96 percent below what existed two centuries ago. “This loss of top predators could hold serious implications for the entire marine ecosystem, greatly affecting food webs throughout this region,” ...
EU will finance Mediterranean 'de-pollution' of hotspots
14 April 2008, EurActiv Network
Three months ahead of the launch of French President Nicolas Sarkozy's primed ' Union for the Mediterranean ', the Commission has stepped on Paris 's toes by presenting plans to finance pollution reduction in the Mediterranean Sea ...
Dumping garbage from ships will become illegal ... on 1st May 2009
10 April 2008
The Marine Environment Protection Committee of IMO (International Maritime Organization) at its 57th Session adopted, a few days ago, a resolution establishing May 1st, 2009, as the date on which the MARPOL Annex V (Regulations for the Prevention of Pollution by Garbage from Ships) special area regulations shall take effect in the Mediterranean Sea ...
A new organisation will boost implementation of EU integrated maritime policy and Common Fisheries Policy
27 March 2008, adapted from European Commission Press corner
The European Commission has decided on a far-reaching reorganisation of the Directorate-General in charge of Fisheries and Maritime Affairs. The former “DG FISH” becomes the Directorate-General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries and will now be known as DG MARE ...
1ère apparition des coraux sur la Liste rouge de l’UICN
septembre 2007, CIESM News
Pour la première fois, des coraux ont été inscrits sur la Liste rouge de l'UICN. Dix espèces de coraux des îles Galápagos (Equateur) - patrimoine mondial de l'UNESCO depuis 1978 ...
Sinking of R/V Thetis south of Sicily
August 2007, CIESM News
On August 4th, on a clear day, about 4 miles south of the coast of Sicily, the Italian Research Vessel “Thetis” was sunk following a collision with the merchant vessel "Heleni" registered in Panama. All 14 people on board, including eight marine biologists, were rapidly rescued - some with serious injuries - from the waters ...
The Aberdeen Declaration, endorsed on 22 June by European Research Institutions and CIESM (view DG position), calls for integrated EU action in the marine domain.
Les coraux rouges placés sous la protection de la CITES
June 2007, CIESM News
(AFP) - Les coraux rouges Corallium ont été placés parmi les espèces protégées de la CITES (Convention sur le commerce international des espèces de faune et de flore sauvages menacées d'extinction), lors de sa Conférence Mondiale qui vient de se réunir à La Haye ...
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