UT ESTONIAN MARINE INSTITUTE JOINS AS PARTNER IN GLOBAL MARINE STUDIES PROGRAMME
02.01.2008
The CML, which brings together more than 300 partners, was launched in 2000 and is set to end in 2010. The total budget of the programme is over 100 million US dollars and its principal sponsor the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (USA). Research conducted under the aegis of the programme has led to the discovery of dozens of new species and yielded descriptions of exotic, hitherto unknown ecosystems (such as chemosynthetic ecosystems), or hydrothermal vents with recorded temperatures above 400°C.
Henn Ojaveer, Senior Research Fellow at UT Estonian Marine Institute, is a member of the Steering Group of the History of Marine Animal Populations, one of the component programmes of CML and is responsible for the relevant research conducted in the entire Baltic Sea area. “The purpose of our work, in cooperation between historians and marine ecologists, is to reconstruct the ecosystem of the Baltic Sea as it was centuries ago. The research already commenced in 2000 and by now the first substantial overview of our work has been published as a special edition of Fisheries Research,” said Ojaveer, who was also the guest editor of the special issue.
As an example of the new discoveries made in the course of CML, Henn Ojaveer reveals: “As a result of a study of the personal archives of Karl Ernst von Baer, a world-renowned scientist who worked at the University of Tartu, we can now say that the temporary apparent decline in fish stocks (including those of Baltic herring, our principal commercial fish) in the first half of the 19th century cannot be attributed to overfishing, as it was thought, but rather simply to bad fishing weather.”
In addition to Sloan Foundation, the work carried out as part of the CML was also funded by three projects within the EU’s Sixth Framework Programme: MARBEF (Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning), EUR-OCEANS (European Network of Excellence for Ocean Ecosystems Analysis) and INCOFISH (Integrating Multiple Demands on Coastal Zones with Emphasis on Aquatic Ecosystems and Fisheries).
Additional information: Henn Ojaveer, Senior Research Fellow at UT Estonian Marine Institute, phone +372 443 4456, +372 515 8328
Anneli Maaring
UT Press Representative
phone +372 737 5683; +372 515 0184
anneli [dot] maaring [ät] ut [dot] ee
/64160
Henn Ojaveer, Senior Research Fellow at UT Estonian Marine Institute, is a member of the Steering Group of the History of Marine Animal Populations, one of the component programmes of CML and is responsible for the relevant research conducted in the entire Baltic Sea area. “The purpose of our work, in cooperation between historians and marine ecologists, is to reconstruct the ecosystem of the Baltic Sea as it was centuries ago. The research already commenced in 2000 and by now the first substantial overview of our work has been published as a special edition of Fisheries Research,” said Ojaveer, who was also the guest editor of the special issue.
As an example of the new discoveries made in the course of CML, Henn Ojaveer reveals: “As a result of a study of the personal archives of Karl Ernst von Baer, a world-renowned scientist who worked at the University of Tartu, we can now say that the temporary apparent decline in fish stocks (including those of Baltic herring, our principal commercial fish) in the first half of the 19th century cannot be attributed to overfishing, as it was thought, but rather simply to bad fishing weather.”
In addition to Sloan Foundation, the work carried out as part of the CML was also funded by three projects within the EU’s Sixth Framework Programme: MARBEF (Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning), EUR-OCEANS (European Network of Excellence for Ocean Ecosystems Analysis) and INCOFISH (Integrating Multiple Demands on Coastal Zones with Emphasis on Aquatic Ecosystems and Fisheries).
Additional information: Henn Ojaveer, Senior Research Fellow at UT Estonian Marine Institute, phone +372 443 4456, +372 515 8328
Anneli Maaring
UT Press Representative
phone +372 737 5683; +372 515 0184
anneli [dot] maaring [ät] ut [dot] ee
/64160