On October 17th, 2018, INDICIT team co-animated with the Archipelagos Institute of Marine Conservation (Greece) and Barcelona convention Specially Protected Areas Regional Activity Centre (Tunisia) one of the 6 workshops of the 6th MedTurtle conference. 95 participants attended the workshop, 15 Mediterranean countries and 5 non-Mediterranean countries were represented.
This conference, supported in particular by United Nations Mediterranean Action Plan and Bern convention, provided a good opportunity to meet all the sea turtle specialists of the Mediterranean region at a time. The topic being this year “building synergies”, it was particularly suited for discussing one of the goals of INDICIT project: stimulating networking and disseminating the tools designed by the consortium for monitoring ingestion and entanglement of sea turtles in marine debris.
The rich agenda allowed to present the context of the marine debris monitoring needs, and the ongoing work on the topic around the basin, such as the Marine Litter Med Programme, MedSealitter and INDICIT projects and local initiatives (see attached agenda). During the discussion, most of the attendees expressed a high interest in sharing their experience, in using a standard protocol and building further collaborations.
Six outcomes will be soon shared with the participants: i) a map and list of stakeholders involved or to be involved in monitoring, ii) the pdf presentations; iii) the existing protocols and links to download them, iv) a list of stakeholders using/wishing to use standard protocols, v) recommendations for further development including a list of needs for reinforcing capacities.
Workshop resources:
- Agenda of the workshop
- INDICIT survey on entanglement and ingestion in marine fauna
- General workshop presentation
- SPA/RAC presentation
- INDICIT presentation
- MEDSEALITTER presentation
- Archipelagos presentation
- University of Padua presentation
- UFRGS presentation
Several posters were also presented during the conference :
- Is the loggerhead Caretta caretta a good indicator of plastic ingestion also at local scale?
- Assessment of litter ingeston by loggerhead sea turtles (Caretta caretta) in the Mediterranean Sea, an INDICIT outcome
- Presence of microplastics in the digestive tracts of stranded loggerhead turtles (Caretta caretta) in the Valencian Community coasts
- Spanish Mediterranean collaborative network for data sharing and standardization of methodologies for monitoring debris impact on sea turtles in the frame of the INDICIT project
- Spatial overlap of large marine vertebrates with floating macro-litter in the Spanish Mediterranean sea
Oral presentation :
