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8 pages, 6 figures, 2 tables, supplementary material https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.wasman.2019.07.004 ; Fisheries are one of the main economic sectors affected by marine litter, which can damage gear, reduce catch, and require time to repair or clean nets. This study aims to evaluate the type and density of marine litter in two shallow fishing grounds in the NW Mediterranean Sea, both belonging to the Natura 2000 network. Moreover, it quantifies the fraction of marine litter within the total catch to help understand the potential influence of marine litter on fisheries. Two study areas were selected, one in the vicinity of urban populated areas and high navigational traffic and one in a rural site off an agricultural area. The urban area had more benthic marine litter (393 to 198 kg km) including clinker (residue from coal-burning steamships), fabric, plastics, and processed wood and accounting for up to 38% of the total catch. The rural area had far less marine litter (34–56 kg km), accounting for only 5% of the total catch. Marine litter may have potential negative effects on fisheries; thus we propose that government credit trading programs could be promoted to help recover litter from fishing catches, to reduce fishing costs and hazards to marine ecosystems ; This paper is a result of the research project "Evaluación y seguimiento del Plan de Gestión de Dragas para Embarcación", ref. AG-2016-233, funded by the Department d'Agricultura, Ramaderia i Pesca (Generalitat de Catalunya) ; Peer Reviewed

Cover -- Introduction -- Chapter 1: Sources and consequences of marine litter -- A. Sources of marine litter -- I. Landward factors and activities leading to the introduction of waste into the marine environment -- 1. Urban agglomerations -- 2. Sanitary and sewage-related waste -- 3. Pollution from waste disposal -- 4. Tourism and recreational activities -- II. Uses of the ocean that lead to marine litter -- 1. Shipping -- a) Operational pollution -- b) Accidental pollution -- 2. Fisheries -- B. Classification and types of marine litter -- I. Spatial appearance of marine litter -- II. Monitoring of litter in the marine environment -- C. Consequences and impacts of marine litter -- I. Ecological impacts -- 1. Entanglement -- 2. Transport vectors for hitch-hiking of non-native species and smothering of marine habitat -- II. Toxicological influences of marine litter by ingestion -- 1. Chemicals contained in plastic -- 2. Material science of plastic -- 3. Microplastics -- a) Primary microplastic -- b) Secondary microplastic -- 4. The uptake of microplastics -- 5. Adsorption of chemicals and metals onto microplastics -- 6. Trophical transfer of persistent microplastics -- 7. Toxicological considerations -- III. Socio-economic impacts -- IV. Preliminary conclusion -- D. Preliminary conclusion - Uncertainties and knowledge gaps -- E. Requirements for an effective and integrated protection instrument -- Chapter 2: Global regulatory framework relating to marine litter -- A. Principles and their approaches to address marine litter -- I. Polluter-pays-principle -- 1. The application of the polluter-pays-principle in agreements -- 2. Function of the polluter-pays-principle in marine litter context -- II. The role of the preventive principle in a marine litter context -- III. The precautionary principle.

Sources and consequences of marine litter -- Global regulatory framework relating to marine litter -- The role of the European Regional Seas Conventions to prevent the introduction of marine litter -- Marine litter in the regulatory context of European Union law

Marine plastic litter and microplastics pollution is a global governance problem with unknown and potentially dire consequences. Efforts to promote individual‐centered solutions to the problem are increasingly necessary but are insufficient to tackle the root causes of the problem. Therefore, a concerted policy response at the global level is imperative. The success of such efforts necessarily depends on the way in which the problem is framed and understood, including its degree of urgency. This paper engages with this problem by considering the nature of the issue in light of the crisis term and argues that the global problem of marine litter may be more productively considered a "creeping crisis" given the complexity, scope, and spatio‐temporally fragmented nature of the problem.

Jährlich gelangen mehr als 6 Millionen Tonnen Abfall in unsere Meere. Aus der Langlebigkeit der eingetragenen Stoffe sowie deren ökologischen und toxischen Auswirkungen ergeben sich besondere Herausforderungen an unsere Gesellschaft. Vor diesem Hintergrund, untersucht und erarbeitet die Autorin Lösungsstrategien zur Vermeidung von Meeresmüll in den vier Europäischen Meeren. Dabei werden sowohl völkerrechtliche sowie Rechtsinstrumente der Europäischen Union auf ihre Regulierungsstrategien untersucht und Regulierungslücken identifiziert. In einer interdisziplinären Herangehensweise, deckt die Autorin Meeresmüllquellen wie Schifffahrt oder Abfallmanagement ab und erarbeitet somit die erste Monographie, die die Gesamtheit von regulativen Meeresmüllvermeidungsstrategien in der Europäischen Union betrachtet

Anthropogenic debris are known to be present in all marine habitats, from coasts to the most remote points of the planet like deep sea floors and poles. In spite of the growing interest from the political and scientific community regarding this spreading threat, the knowledges on marine litter status still remain fragmentary. Most of studies have been carried out on the sea surface and on coastal habitats, whereas there are few information available about the assessment of anthropogenic debris on the sea bottoms. This PhD thesis aims to evaluate the state of benthic marine litter in terms of composition, density and abundance along the continental shelf and continental slope of FAO Geographical Sub Area 11: Sardinia Island (NW Mediterranean Sea) according to Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Soft bottoms and rocky habitats have been investigated separately by mean of two different sampling methods (trawling and ROV video transect). Trawl surveys are defined as the most appropriate way to collect litter on sandy and muddy seafloors. Within the MEDITS (International Mediterranean Trawls Survey) framework, three years repeated survey permitted the acquisition of a marine debris data in a wide bathymetric range. Uni and multivariate analyses were used to test differences between \inshore and offshore habitats and between geographical zones in terms of litter amount. Results highlighted that, among the 302 investigated stations, plastic resulted by far the main component in terms of occurrence, density and abundance. Concentration of debris derived from land- 2 based activities tends to decrease as we move farther from the coastline. Anthropogenic Marine-based activities are supposed to be the main cause of the sudden increased values of debris observed in the deep habitats, which was investigated through the Deep Sea Cruise PSP15 on a bathymetric range comprise between 800-1600 m. The behaviour of fishermen observed and recorded emphasizes the necessity of a change in the management policy for the conservation of the environment. Investigation on rocky habitats have been carried out through the non-invasive technique of ROV footage. All canyons and pinnacles surveyed, showed the presence of anthropic pressure in terms of marine litter. Discarded fishing gears are the main components of all litter observed. Distance from coastline do not cause significant difference of the variation of debris density. In the rocky bottom investigated 26.5% of marine litter damaged the benthonic coral community, indeed urgently needing special protection measures. Our results constitute an important and needed set of information regarding the treat of marine litter in an high ecological value area such as the Mediterranean basin. As a result these information are useful for future spatio-temporal comparisons, as well for a collaboration to create a unique dataset as required by the MSFD, considered a fundamental tool for the development of proper conservation measures.

Jährlich gelangen mehr als 6 Millionen Tonnen Abfall in unsere Meere. Aus der Langlebigkeit der eingetragenen Stoffe sowie deren ökologischen und toxischen Auswirkungen ergeben sich besondere Herausforderungen an unsere Gesellschaft. Vor diesem Hintergrund, untersucht und erarbeitet die Autorin Lösungsstrategien zur Vermeidung von Meeresmüll in den vier Europäischen Meeren. Dabei werden sowohl völkerrechtliche sowie Rechtsinstrumente der Europäischen Union auf ihre Regulierungsstrategien untersucht und Regulierungslücken identifiziert. In einer interdisziplinären Herangehensweise, deckt die Autorin Meeresmüllquellen wie Schifffahrt oder Abfallmanagement ab und erarbeitet somit die erste Monographie, die die Gesamtheit von regulativen Meeresmüllvermeidungsstrategien in der Europäischen Union betrachtet

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV, aka drones) are being used for mapping macro-litter in the environment. As drone images require a manual processing task for detecting marine litter, it is of interest to evaluate the accuracy of non-expert citizen science operators (CSO) in performing this task. Students from Italian secondary schools (in this work, the CSO) were invited to identify, mark, and classify stranded litter items on a UAV orthophoto collected on an Italian beach. A specific training program and working tools were developed for the aim. The comparison with the standard in situ visual census survey returned a general underestimation (50%) of items. However, marine litter bulk categorisation was fairly in agreement with the in situ survey, especially for sources classification. The concordance level among CSO ranged between 60% and 91%, depending on the item properties considered (type, material, and colour). As the assessment accuracy was in line with previous works developed by experts, remote detection of marine litter on UAV images can be improved through citizen science programs, upon an appropriate training plan and provision of specific tools. ; This paper is part of NAUTILOS project that has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 101000825. This work was supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) and by the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER) through COMPETE 2020, Operational Program for Competitiveness and Internationalization (POCI) in the framework of UIDB/ 00308/2020 and the research project UAS4Litter (PTDC/EAM-REM/30324/2017). ; Published ; 3349 ; 7SR AMBIENTE – Servizi e ricerca per la società ; JCR Journal