Ecosystem Health Initiative

Ocean ecosystems are healthy if they can sustain the supply of ecosystem goods and services to coastal societies without compromising their fundamental structure and functioning. COS is shaping its ocean ecosystem health initiative around a series of cross-cutting issues at the forefront of dialogues about ocean sustainability. These include working groups and interdisciplinary teams concentrating on ecosystem-based marine spatial planning, social-ecological systems ocean governance, cumulative impacts, and marine ecosystem thresholds and indicators. The focal areas we use to categorize our work generally—ecosystem health, land-sea interactions and climate change—are synergistic and therefore frequently intersect.