MECN

About MECN

The Marine Environmental Change Network (MECN) is a collaboration between organisations in England, Scotland, Wales, Isle of Man and Northern Ireland collecting long-term time series information for marine waters. It is coordinated by the Marine Biological Association of the UK (MBA) and is funded by the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). The goal of the network is to use long-term marine environmental data from around the British Isles and Ireland to separate natural fluctuations from global, regional and local anthropogenic impacts.

The urgent need for the continuation, restoration and enhancement of marine observations and the establishment of a network of parties involved in this work were identified through an IACMST Review of Current Marine Observations in relation to present and future needs (click here to download a pdf version of the report) and the establishment of the Marine Environmental Change Network is a direct response to this need.

The pilot phase of the MECN was completed in June 2005.

The major aims of the network pilot phase were to:

Establish a network to measure environmental change in marine waters by undertaking long-term research and monitoring
Maintain and enhance existing long-term research programmes
Restart important discontinued long-term research programmes
Develop a quality controlled database of long-term marine data series
Deliver and interpret long-term and broad scale contextual information to inform water quality monitoring
Demonstrate the benefits of preserving and networking long-term time series programmes

Having established and consolidated the network in the pilot phase, the next phase of the MECN began in July, 2005. A key objective of this phase is "ensuring that information is provided to policy makers and other end-users to enable them to produce more accurate accurate assessments of ecosystem state and have a clearer understanding of factors influencing change in marine ecosystems". The link between long-term time series and UK policy is explored in chapter 4 of the report 'The evaluation of time series: their scientific value and contribution to policy needs. (2006) Marine Biological Association Occasional Publications No. 22.' Currently, the MECN is working with the Marine Climate Change Impacts Partnership (MCCIP) in the production of an annual report card on the issue of climate. The MECN is also expected to play a key role in Theme 10 of the Natural Environment Research Council's (NERC) Oceans 2025 strategy in providing a knowledge transfer mechanism allowing information from strategic long-term observations and research programs to be utilised by organisations with a responsibility for the management of UK Seas.