ANNEX IV

LIST OF CURRENT AND POTENTIAL GOOS PROJECTS IN COASTAL AREAS

In developing its strategy, C-GOOS needs to consider its relation to current and possible future GOOS Pilot Projects.

Current Pilot Projects:

  1. NEARGOOS (N.E. Asian region: involves China, Japan, S. Korea, Russia). Primary activity: data exchange in east Asian coastal seas. Future goals:
    1. modelling as the basis for forecasting;
    2. addition of more variables.
  2. EuroGOOS: 30 operational agencies from 16 countries. Primary regional projects: Baltic; Arctic, Northwest shelf (including North Sea); Mediterranean. All variables, but initial focus tends to be on modelling those which are more tractable (physical). Encouraging development of biological and chemical modelling, and collection of data by ferries. Several research projects, totalling 15M Ecu, recently funded by European Commission.

Possible Future Pilot Projects:

  1. PacificGOOS: from Australia/NZ up through Pacific islands to New Guinea. Status: Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between IOC and SOPAC. Officer appointed by SOPAC to see to GOOS development; consultant needed to write strategic plan.
  2. MEDGOOS: differs from EuroGOOS Mediterranean Forecasting Project:
    1. in focussing on immediate operations rather than research towards eventual operations; and
    2. in involving all Med countries.

    Status: attendees at GOOS Capacity Building workshop in Malta in November 1997 agreed to work with their governments to take MEDGOOS forward. Two regional workshops are proposed as the next step (one eastern and one western Mediterranean).

  3. BLACKMARS: proposal for Black Sea GOOS, addressing pollution and living marine resource issues. Status: may be taken forward by the Black Sea states operating with IOC.
  4. SEA-GOOS: South-east Asian seas. Status: the community held a workshop at the IOC WESTPAC Science Conference in February 1998 to discuss the priorities and the mechanisms for taking this forward. A bid is expected to be put to UNESCO in 1998 for start-up funds. An initial focus is the oceanography of the Gulf of Thailand.
  5. WIOMAP: East African coastal states and Western Indian Ocean island states. The WIOMAP concept has been led by WMO (jointly with IOC),and led to a workshop in Mauritius in 1996, at which the concept was refined. A proposal has been submitted for funding.
  6. Caribbean-GOOS: could begin to spin up late in 1998. Discussions are taking place between IOC and IOCARIBE about how this initiative might be taken forward.

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HOTO Priority areas

The geographic areas below, taken from the HOTO strategic plan (table 5), could be targets for regional HOTO pilot projects. They are ranked by the score given in the HOTO plan (table 5), with the highest score indicating the poorest environmental health. The worst cases are given first.
  1. Black Sea (score 37): Comment
    1. a possible HOTO Black Sea Pilot Project was suggested at the HOTO Singapore Meeting, 13-17 October 1997;
    2. there is considerable interest in the Black Sea (see notes above on BLACKMARS project).
  2. Asian Seas (score 30): Comment
    1. a possible N.E. Asian Seas HOTO Pilot Project was suggested at the HOTO Singapore Meeting, 13-17 October 1997;
    2. there is already a UNEP Regional Seas project (NOWPAP) in the area, to which this might relate;
    3. this could dovetail nicely with the physical work being carried out in NEARGOOS (above), although the NEARGOOS steering committee does not want to include pollution at this time because it feels it has its work cut out to get the physics working;
    4. a possible S.E. Asian Seas HOTO Pilot Project was also suggested at the HOTO Singapore Meeting; this could be a focus for SEA-GOOS (see above), when it gets started.
  3. Great Lakes and Baltic Sea (score 29): Comment
    1. GOOS at this time is focussing on salt water not on lakes;
    2. work in the Baltic is being undertaken under the umbrella of EuroGOOS, and includes extensive pollution monitoring by HELCOM, so a HOTO initiative is not needed.
  4. Mediterranean and North Sea (score 27): Comment
    1. the Mediterranean is being attended to by EuroGOOS and MEDGOOS, but their focus seems to be on the physics of the system, so there may be room to insert a HOTO element - this needs discussion with the MEDGOOS community;
    2. the North Sea is being attended to by EuroGOOS and by other groupings of North Sea nations, and pollution is addressed through the work of OSPARCOM, so there may be no need for a HOTO initiative here.
  5. Caribbean and West Africa (score 25): Comment
    1. there is currently no GOOS activity in either region;
    2. neither region was discussed in terms of Pilot Projects at the HOTO Singapore Meeting.
  6. Arabian Gulf (score 20): Comment - was not discussed in terms of Pilot Projects at the HOTO Singapore Meeting.
  7. Northern Former Soviet Union (score 18): Comment - a possible HOTO Pilot Project in the Arctic was discussed at the HOTO Singapore Meeting.
  8. Red Sea (score 16): Comment - a HOTO Red Sea Pilot Project was discussed at the HOTO Singapore Meeting.

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