The IHCantabria Marsha project will be funded by the State Research Agency of the Ministry of Science and Innovation.

IHCantabria researchers Bárbara Ondiviela and Cristina Galván lead the MarshA project, whose title is: “Environmental restoration beyond biodiversity: How to integrate estuarine ecosystem services in nature-based management”.

The MarshA project focuses on the study of Zostera noltei seagrass meadows in Cantabrian estuaries and how they contribute to the restoration of ecosystem services. Its development is intended to promote the restoration of degraded ecosystems and the provision of ecosystem services. To achieve this, MarshA will generate new knowledge and tools that will help in making decisions regarding the restoration of marine phanerogams.

Based on field, experimental, numerical modeling, and remote sensing data, this project will focus on assessing and predicting the provisioning (biodiversity) and regulating (carbon sequestration, coastal protection) ecosystem services that restored seagrasses will provide. Through the evaluation of these services, their contribution to both biodiversity conservation and climate change adaptation and mitigation will be estimated. The metrics developed will be validated in Atlantic estuaries, from an approach that will consider different biophysical, social, economic and governance scenarios.

MarshA is based on the premise of the United Nations Decade of Ecosystem Restoration 2021-2030: “the healthier our ecosystems are, the healthier the planet and its inhabitants will be”. The project highlights the important role that seagrasses play in the temperate coasts of the North Atlantic and recognizes the challenges faced by coastal managers when addressing restoration projects to enhance the provision of ecosystem services.

For its execution, this project is financed by the Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICIN), with funds from the Spanish Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR), through the NextGenerationEU funds. This aid has been granted under the Call for aid to strategic projects oriented to the Ecological Transition and the Digital Transition, of the State Plan for Scientific, Technical and Innovation Research 2021-2023. The execution of this project is from December 1, 2022 to November 30, 2024.

To learn more visit the
project website