HELSINKI COMMISSION
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011
JOINT ADVISORY BOARD CORESET/TARGREV
Fifth Meeting
Helsinki, Finland, 16-17 November 2011
Agenda Item 2
Information by the Secretariat
Document code:
2/1
Date:
10.11.2011
Submitted by:
Secretariat
EXTRACT OF THE OUTCOME OF THE FIFTEENTH MEETING OF HELCOM MONAS
The Fifteenth meeting of HELCOM MONAS was held on 4-7 October 2011 in Vilnius,
Lithuania. The Meeting was attended by all HELCOM Contracting Parties as well as
representatives of International Council for the Exploration of the Seas (ICES), Co-operative
Programme for Monitoring and Evaluation of the Long-range Transmission of Air Pollutants
in Europe (EMEP) and the Baltic Nest Institute (BNI). The Meeting was chaired by Ms. AnnaStiina Heiskanen, Finland and Mr. Lars M. Svendsen, Denmark.
This document presents extracts of the meeting outcome related to the activities of HELCOM
CORESET and TARGREV projects and core indicators.
The Meeting is invited to take note of the outcome.
Page 1 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
EXTRACT OF THE OUTCOME OF THE FIFTEENTH MEETING OF HELCOM
MONAS
The fifteenth meeting of HELCOM MONAS was held on 4-7 October 2011 in Vilnius,
Lithuania. This document presents extracts of the meeting outcome related to the activities of
HELCOM CORESET and TARGREV projects and core indicators.
The outcome has been divided to four themes: CORESET project, TARGREV project,
eutrophication core indicators and nutrient input core indicators. Reference to respective
paragraph is given for each extract.
CORESET PROJECT:
[paragr. 4.20] The Meeting thanked the HELCOM CORESET project, and especially
the outgoing Project Researcher Ms. Ulla Li Zweifel, Sweden, for their hard work,
excellent progress and good preliminary results and emphasized that the results are
necessary for implementing the Baltic Sea Action Plan and are also very useful for
implementation of the MSFD at the national level.
[paragr. 4.22] The Meeting recalled that the background report and the
supplementary report on preliminary core indicators are expert reports and their
purpose is to serve as expert advice that may be used by Contracting Parties also
for implementation of the MSFD. The Meeting also recalled that the intention is to
develop core indicators that should eventually be commonly monitored by all
HELCOM countries to enable follow-up of the implementation of the BSAP.
[paragr. 4.23] The Meeting emphasized the interim report nature of the background
report “Development of HELCOM core set indicators with GES boundaries” (cf.
paragraph Error! Reference source not found.) and the supplementary report with
detailed descriptions of the proposed and candidate indicators (cf. paragraph Error!
Reference source not found.) and agreed that the reports should be thoroughly
reviewed by national experts in terms of their scientific content. The Meeting agreed
that the reports should be made freely available by publishing them in the HELCOM
Baltic Sea Environment Proceedings Series on the HELCOM web page. The
Meeting stressed that the expert advice nature of the reports needs to be made
clear and agreed on the inclusion of the following disclaimer to be inserted into the
inner cover page of the report:
“This report is an expert report of the HELCOM CORESET project on the
development of HELCOM core indicators, containing advice on the identification of
core indicators to assess the state of the Baltic Sea marine environment in order to
follow up the implementation of the Baltic Sea Action Plan and to facilitate the
national implementation of the EU MSFD according to the role of HELCOM as a
platform for regional coordination.”
[paragr. 4.25] The Meeting invited the Contracting Parties to submit their nationally
coordinated comments on the reports using tracked changes in the word versions of
documents 4/4 and 4/5 that are available in the HELCOM Meeting Portal under the
folders Monitoring and Assessment Group » MONAS meetings » MONAS 15, 2011)
and to submit these to the HELCOM CORESET Project Manager
([email protected]) by 4 November 2010. The Meeting requested the
Project Manager to submit the updated report by 10 November 2011 for the
consideration of HELCOM JAB 5/2011 and invited HELCOM JAB 5/2011 to consider
the revised report and whether the report can be forward to the meeting of HELCOM
HOD 36/2011 for approval.
[paragr. 4.26] The Meeting was of the opinion that after the HELCOM CORESET
project the work on further developing core indicators on biodiversity, hazardous
substances and eutrophication needs to be continued and that this needs to be
synchronized with national activities related to implementation of MSFD and WFD.
Page 2 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
The Meeting agreed on the next steps and milestone as contained in the outcome of
the drafting group (Annex 2).
[paragr. 4.27] The Meeting agreed on the arranging of the workshops of the
hazardous substances experts of HELCOM CORESET (HELCOM CORESET HS
5/2012) on 11-12 January 2012, and of the biodiversity experts of HELCOM
CORESET (HELCOM CORESET BD 5/2012) as well as of eutrophication experts
working on core eutrophication indicators (HELCOM CORE EUTRO 5/2012) in
spring 2012.
[paragr. 4.28] The Meeting took note that a HELCOM expert workshop on
improvement of HELCOM assessment tools, will be held on 15-16 December 2011
in Gothenburg, Sweden, and agreed that this workshop should further discuss
principles for HELCOM assessments, revisit the HELCOM assessment tools,
including assessment scales, discuss and clarify the relationships between
assessment results from the HELCOM tools and WFD assessments, and plan the
assessment work of HELCOM towards the HELCOM 2013 ministerial meeting. The
Meeting invited the Contracting Parties to provide input to the workshop based on
the above issues to be addressed during the workshop. The Meeting welcomed the
offer of the HELCOM MONAS Chair, Ms. Anna-Stiina Heiskanen, Finland, to chair
the workshop and invited Mr. Jesper Andersen, Denmark to contribute to the
workshop, e.g. with information on the development of tools under the HARMONY
project.
[paragr. 4.29] The Meeting emphasized that the HELCOM CORESET work is an
essential basis for the revision of the HELCOM monitoring programme and should
increasingly focus on providing detailed information on monitoring needs and gaps
for the different proposed core indicators. The Meeting also stressed that when
considering joint regional monitoring; not only gaps, but also synergies and overlaps
in monitoring at the regional level should be considered in order to ensure cost
effective and efficient access to data for assessment of progress towards reaching
national and international obligations.
[paragr. 4.30] The Meeting considered the need to establish a phytobenthos expert
group and agreed that such an expert group would be necessary for developing and
regularly updating core indicators. The Meeting noted that HELCOM expert groups
such as HELCOM FISH-PRO (cf. paragraph Error! Reference source not found.),
HELCOM MORS (cf. paragraph Error! Reference source not found.) and
HELCOM LOAD (cf. paragraph Error! Reference source not found.) are
contributing to HELCOM core indicator work and was of the opinion that other
HELCOM expert groups should be tasked to carry out similar activities.
[ANNEX 2] Outcome of the drafting group to consider the background report and the
CORESET activities:
1) How to emphasize the expert nature of the report?
- To underline in the introduction of the report that this is a scientific report and an
interim outcome of an expert project.
- To include a time line with next steps into the beginning of the report (see below)
- To include a disclaimer to the inner cover of the report:
“This report is an expert report of the HELCOM CORESET project on the
development of HELCOM core indicators, containing advice on the identification
of core indicators to assess the state of the Baltic Sea marine environment in
order to follow up the implementation of the Baltic Sea Action Plan and to
facilitate the national implementation of the EU MSFD according to the role of
HELCOM as a platform for regional coordination.”
2) Next steps (see the graph below)
Page 3 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
a. Workshops, meetings
b. Expert groups
c. Milestones
The Meeting took note of a comment by Germany that the implementation process
of the BSAP and MSFD should be better streamlined, especially concerning
assessment reports, and that the HELCOM assessment scheduled for 2013 may
differ in content from the initial assessment of the MSFD.
3) Needed revisions
a. One nationally coordinated set of comments from each Contracting Party with
track changes to the Word version of the documents 4/4 and 4/5 submitted to
HELCOM MONAS 15/2011 (Word version is available in the HELCOM Meeting
Portal under the folders Monitoring and Assessment Group » MONAS meetings »
MONAS 15, 2011).
b. Add the time line (above) to the introduction of the report.
c. To mention in the background report and in the core indicator documentation that
the GES boundaries are examples, based on the approach used. (version to be
submitted to HELCOM JAB 5/2011)
d. Secretariat will add some more text on existing HELCOM monitoring programmes
that currently is missing in the draft (version to be submitted to HELCOM JAB
5/2011).
e. There was a wish in the drafting group to have an estimate of the costs of the
monitoring of core indicators for CPs but this should be included into the future
work of HELCOM CORESET and HELCOM MORE on discussing further in detail
monitoring needs.
f. Link to pressures should be explained clearly: if relation is not scientifically well
established it should be expressed.
4) Review process
a. Contracting Parties’ comments by 4 November 2011 to the Secretariat
b. To include in the MONAS minutes that the purpose of the commenting round is to
provide improvements to scientific content of the report.
Page 4 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
c. Secretariat to combine comments by track changes
d. HELCOM JAB 5/2011 on 16-17 November 2011 to review the reviewed and
revised report.
e. Secretariat to make possible additional changes based on comments by
HELCOM JAB 5/2011.
f. Secretariat to submit to HOD for approval for publishing if HELCOM JAB5/2011
agrees to recommend publishing.
g. Lay-out process and publication on the HELCOM web site in the early 2012.
TARGREV PROJECT:
[paragr. 5.1] The Meeting welcomed of the draft outline of the HELCOM TARGREV
report “Approaches and methods for eutrophication target setting in the Baltic Sea
region” as presented by Mr. Jesper Andersen, Aarhus University (presentation 5,
document 5/7), in particular the elaboration of new eutrophication targets for open
sea areas and the elaboration of an indicator on oxygen debt. The Meeting
appreciated the work carried out by the HELCOM TARGREV project and took note
that the final report of the HELCOM TARGREV project is due by the end of October
2011.
[paragr. 5.2] The Meeting took note of the preliminary nature of the HELCOM
TARGREV draft report and agreed that access to it should remain restricted on the
HELCOM Meeting Portal.
[paragr. 5.3] The Meeting considered the contents of the report and invited the
HELCOM TARGREV project to consider presenting the actual target values in
tables in the final report so that Contracting Parties can compare the values also
with targets for coastal areas under the WFD.
[paragr. 5.4] The Meeting requested the Secretariat to submit the final report to the
HELCOM MONAS and HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB contacts on 1
November 2011 for review and invited the Contracting Parties to submit their
possible comments to the Project Coordinator ([email protected]), with a copy to the
Secretariat ([email protected]), by 24 November 2011 with the aim to
subsequently submit the revised final report to HELCOM HOD 36/2011 (5-6
December 2011) for approval to publish the report in the HELCOM Baltic Sea
Environment Proceedings series.
EUTROPHICATION CORE INDICATORS (HELCOM CORE EUTRO):
[paragr. 4.31] The Meeting took note of the outcome of the fourth intersessional
workshop of HELCOM MONAS on the development of HELCOM core
eutrophication indicators (HELCOM CORE EUTRO 4/2011) that was held in
Helsinki, Finland, on 15-16 September 2011 (document 4/3).
[paragr. 4.32] The Meeting welcomed the progress in the updating of core
eutrophication indicators, including the technical background document which
illustrates the assessment units and data criteria used for updating the
eutrophication indicators (document 4/8). The Meeting supported, in general, the
procedure used to update the core eutrophication indicators.
[paragr. 4.33] The Meeting took note of the need to review the eutrophication data,
reference conditions and acceptable deviations and to subsequently update the core
eutrophication indicator maps. The Meeting invited Contracting Parties to check the
maps and their national data used for the assessment (making use of the Excel files
saved in the HELCOM Meeting Portal under the folders Monitoring and Assessment
Group » CORESET/TARGREV » CORE EUTRO 4/2011) and to provide their
Page 5 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
possible comments and corrections to the Secretariat ([email protected]) by
4 November 2011.
[paragr. 4.34] The Meeting noted that data reported by Contracting Parties via
EIONET for WFD reporting purposes is currently not included in the eutrophication
indicator maps and invited the Secretariat and ICES to ensure that this data is also
made available for HELCOM assessment purposes.
[paragr. 4.35] The Meeting noted that some amendments in the assessment units
will need to be made (e.g. German areas to be shown at the water body level) and
invited
also
other
Contracting
Parties
to
inform
the
Secretariat
([email protected]) by 4 November 2011 of any changes needed to be
made in their coastal assessment units.
[paragr. 4.36] The Meeting took note of the comment by Denmark that they have not
agreed on reference conditions or acceptable deviations for the eutrophication
indicators used by HELCOM and that Danish coastal waters should therefore not be
included in the updated eutrophication indicators.
[paragr. 4.37] The Meeting requested the Secretariat to carry out the updating of the
eutrophication indicators, in cooperation with ICES and the national experts. The
Meeting agreed that the updated eutrophication maps should be submitted to the
Contracting Parties for checking via corresponds before being updated onto the
HELCOM website.
[paragr. 4.38] The Meeting recalled that the HELCOM TARGREV project will be
presenting revised eutrophication targets for open sea areas in its outcome (cf.
paragraph Error! Reference source not found.) which is due in the end of October
and agreed that these should be considered vis a vis the HELCOM eutrophication
indicators’ targets and whether changes will be needed.
[paragr. 4.39] The Meeting stressed that there is a need to continue the
intersessional work on further developing the eutrophication indicators and agreed
that use of HELCOM TARGREV results for the eutrophication core indicators should
be discussed at the HELCOM CORE EUTRO 5/2011 workshop in spring 2012 with
the aim to then report on the possible needs to change the targets of the core
eutrophication indicators to HELCOM MONAS 16/2012.
[paragr. 4.40] The Meeting noted the status of missing indicators on phytoplankton,
marcophytobenthos, zoobenthos and oxygen and welcomed the information that
there has been progress in developing zoobenthos and oxygen indicators under the
HELCOM TARGREV project (cf. paragraph Error! Reference source not found.).
NUTRIENT INPUT INDICATORS:
[paragr. 5.25] The Meeting considered the draft core pressure indicator on nutrient
loads for the follow-up of the progress towards BSAP nutrient load targets as
contained in document 5/5. The Meeting took note that the indicator is not yet
finalized and will be updated and further developed (e.g. with the inclusion of
atmospheric deposition data and comments proposed by the drafting group on
HELCOM LOAD issues as contained in Annex 3) before being presented to
HELCOM MONAS 16/2012.
[paragr. 5.26] The Meeting agreed that the follow-up of the HELCOM TARGREV
project (i.e. cooperation between HELCOM LOAD and BNI) should consider the
linkage between pressure and state indicators for eutrophication and especially the
time lags from reduction in nutrient losses to full effects in the open sea. The
Meeting welcomed the information by BNI that the outcome of HELCOM TARGREV
project is expected to include some conclusions about linkages between pressure
and state indicators.
Page 6 of 7
HELCOM CORESET/TARGREV JAB 5/2011, Document 2/1
[ANNEX 3] Core input indicator (document 5/5): provide advice to the HELCOM
LOAD Core Group on how to further develop the core indicator for the follow-up of
the progress towards BSAP nutrient load targets, what is missing?
The Drafting Group:
− noted that the aim of the document is to show the progress in developing the
indicator and will be further developed before HELCOM MONAS 16/2012
− supported the proposals made by the HELCOM LOAD Core Group
− noted that the indicator will be updated to include also the airborne deposition of
nitrogen
− ask the follow up process of TARGREV (i.e. HELCOM LOAD in cooperation with
BNI) to consider the linkage between pressure and state indicators for
eutrophication when reviewing environmental targets and max allowable inputs
and taking into account the time lags from reduction in nutrient losses to full
effects are seen in the open sea
− requested the HELCOM LOAD core group to consider how to present the tables
on page 4 and 5 in a coherent way which is understandable for decision makers,
and supported to show max-allowable input for all countries/sub-basin
Page 7 of 7