Biodiversity Committee 2025
OSPAR’s Biodiversity Committee (BDC) met in February at the kind invitation of the Government of Sweden in Varberg. Varberg sits on the coast of the Kattegat, forming part of the OSPAR maritime area, and is home to several Marine Protected Areas of the OSPAR network including coastal sites important for birds and shallows and banks further out to sea.
In these inspiring coastal surroundings, BDC discussed its contributions to the upcoming Ministerial meeting on 26 June in Vigo, Spain, including technical and communication products intended for announcement at the Ministerial meeting, where BDC hoped to increase political momentum for OSPAR’s work to protect and conserve marine biodiversity.
One important piece of work discussed was the OSPAR Regional Action Plan on Marine Birds (RAP-Bird), which will deliver actions that contribute to OSPAR’s objective to halt the decline of marine birds. Roughly half of the RAP-Bird tasks are being taken forward under the lead of OSPAR Contracting Parties, and it is hoped that leads will be found for the remaining tasks before the Ministerial meeting, giving OSPAR a fully resourced plan to deliver enhanced protection for marine birds.
BDC also discussed a scoping document and plans for a Regional Action Plan on benthic habitats (RAP-Benthic), that aims to bring together the existing work across the whole OSPAR remit of relevance to benthic habitats, identify opportunities to collaborate, and identify potential gaps where further actions under a RAP-Benthic could add to OSPAR’s existing work and protect and restore benthic habitats.
BDC also undertook some comprehensive planning for the biodiversity elements of the next OSPAR assessment of the status of the North-East Atlantic - the Intermediate Assessment 2029 - and considered proposals for new indicators for turtle abundance and turtle bycatch alongside proposals for indicator promotions, extensions and pilots, and noted that calls for data to support those indicators would begin this year.
BDC reviewed eight Status Assessments of OSPAR Listed Threatened and/or Declining Habitats, including bird species representing the full geographical range of the OSPAR maritime area, fish species and habitats. Looking forward, the Committee will seek to collaborate more closely with the Environmental Impacts of Human Activities Committee to consider whether and what measures could be taken to address the findings of the Status Assessments and improve the status of Listed species and habitats.
BDC welcomed and approved draft OSPAR Guidance on Other Effective Area-Based conservation Measures (OECMs) prepared by a task group under the OSPAR expert group on Marine Protected Areas. OECMs provide an area-based management tool to compliment the OSPAR MPA network and contribute to OSPAR’s target to protect 30% of the OSPAR maritime area by 2030 and could help improve connectivity of the network.
BDC also discussed progress with various tasks that are vital in delivering its commitments under the North-East Atlantic Environmental Strategy (NEAES) 2030. While progress had been made on some tasks, BDC has defined many tasks that are not currently being progressed because of a lack of resources, which would affect the Committee’s ability to deliver against the biodiversity objectives of the NEAES. The Committee discussed how to convey this important message as OSPAR prepares for the Ministerial meeting.
To close the 2025 meeting of BDC, the Committee re-elected Nina Schroeder (Germany) as BDC Chair and Marianne Olsen (Norway) as vice-Chair for a further two-year period, at the same time as warmly thanking outgoing vice-Chair Antoine Pebayle (France) and wishing him well for the future.
