Second Round of Regional Working Group Meetings

The second round of Regional Working Group (RWG) Meetings for the five Project components - Fisheries, Biodiversity, Pollution, Ecosystem, Investment - were held from October to December 2005. The natural science components reviewed the progress of data and information collected, agreed on ways to present the final data products, revised the preliminary causal chain analysis based on the data each group had in hand, finalised the arrangements for the winter co-operative study cruise, and provided guidance on implementing future activities.

The Investment RWG Meeting discussed matters related to public awareness and participation, governance analysis for the Transboundary Diagnostic Analysis, environmental valuation, development of the Project’s databases, financial sustainability, and national and regional project co-ordination and collaboration. Integrated governance analysis will be carried out by each country, and include three analytical works: 1) Stakeholder Analysis, 2) Institutional Analysis, and 3) Legal and Policy Analysis.
All RWGs proposed some new activities which were presented to the Regional Science and Technical Panel and the Project Steering Committee for approval.

Some of the suggested new activities include:

• Visiting Scientist Programme and marine litter survey for the Pollution Component
• Benthos and sediment core sampling during the spring co-operative cruise for the Ecosystem Component
• A technical workshop on gene pool analysis for the Biodiversity Component
• A Small Grants Project under the Investment Component
• A technical preparation meeting for the spring co-operative cruise for the Fisheries Component.

The full Meeting reports are available from the Project website, http://www.yslme.org, or contact info@yslme.org for hard copies.

2nd RWG-P Meeting, Korea National Fisheries Research and Development Institute, Busan, Korea, 7-10 November 2005.