IBAM: IBAM - Integrated Bayesian risk analysis of ecosystem management - Gulf of Finland as case study

Funding Programme: Baltic Organisations Network for Funding Science (BONUS)

The main objective of IBAM is to create an environmental decision model for the Gulf of Finland. The model integrates risk management of five themes: fisheries, eutrophication, oil spills, dioxin risks related to the consumption of herring, and climate change. It will also include uncertainty in human responses to management, and will be used to rank decision options in an interdisciplinary and multiobjective context. The project will enable more effective learning in science by providing systematic tools and probabilistic data bases of state of nature to be used as prior information for future studies.

In addition to doing new research, IBAM will integrate results and utilize methodology from several previous projects such as OILECO, EVAGULF, PRONE, POORFISH, EVAHER, and JAKFISH.

Important themes are:

• Integration of risks: What happens when a species/population is threatened by several risks at the same time?
• Evaluation of management: Would integrated management of all sea-related pressures (oil transport, fishing, nutrient loading...) bring benefits compared to the current situation?
• Accounting for uncertainties in every step of the management process: stochasticity of natural processes, lack of knowledge about natural responses, uncertainty in human responses to management (Bayesian modelling)