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SIGNIFICANT OUTCOME: United Nations World Ocean
Assessment (WOA)
In support of the WOA, GRID-Arendal has created a
dedicated website and helped to organize capacity-
building workshops. The new website provides
information for the general public as well as an editorial
system to assist members of the WOA Group of Experts
to compile information and draft their report by the end of
2014. The workshops have enabled developing countries
in South East Asia and West Africa to conduct their own
SoME reporting and to thus be able to participate in and
contribute to the WOA.
GRID-Arendal has also developed a new web-based
SoME reporting system designed to be populated
with information gathered during workshops from
regional and national marine experts. The so-called
expert elicitation method, successfully applied by GRID-
Arendal during workshops in Bangkok and Abidjan, is
ideally suited to developing country situations, where
conventional scientific data comprised of long time series
are rarely available. Instead, the expert elicitation method
is based on gathering local knowledge and unpublished
evidence from local experts in a workshop setting.
lence, playing key roles in the Blue Carbon Portal,25 the
(GEF) Blue Forests Project and the Abu Dhabi Blue Car-
bon Demonstration Project. GRID-Arendal’s efforts are
closely coordinated with UNEP’s Blue Carbon Initiative.
SIGNIFICANT OUTCOME: The Blue Carbon concept
gathers momentum
The Blue Carbon concept has received rapidly growing
interest since GRID-Arendal raised awareness in 2009.
Evidence of this ‘sea change’ includes:
• a synthesis of publications advancing Blue Carbon
policy, economics and science published (by The
World Bank, Duke University, UNEP-WCMC, NOAA,
Climate Focus, Resources for the Futureand others);
• many peer-reviewed journal articles advancing Blue
Carbon science;
• international working groups set up to address Blue
Carbon science and policy issues;
• methodologies developed for assessing Blue Car-
bon stocks; multiple Blue Carbon demonstration
projects around the world are now attempting to
employ these methodologies (including the United
Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Vietnam, Kenya, Senegal,
and Bangladesh).
25. C:\Users\luana\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache\
Content.Outlook\SMKGGTOL
 Blue Carbon Programme
The Blue Carbon Programme continues to parallel inter-
national momentum and interest in the concept as one of
GRID-Arendal’s fastest growing efforts. Blue Carbon is a
recent concept that describes the role certain coastal and
marine ecosystems play in climate change mitigation and
adaptation. Coastal Blue Carbon ecosystems include man-
grove forests, seagrass meadows, and saltwater marsh-
lands, which have been found to store carbon at rates
sometimes greater than tropical rain forests. These eco-
systems are also vital for coastal and island communities
through the other services they provide, such as shoreline
protection, fish nursery and habitat, tourism, and cultural
significance.
The importance of Blue Carbon was brought to the at-
tention of the international community by the 2009
UNEP Rapid Response Assessment Blue Carbon - The
Role of Healthy Oceans in Binding Carbon,24 produced
by GRID-Arendal, and an IUCN report entitled The Man-
agement of Natural Coastal Carbon Sinks. Following the
international interest stimulated by these reports, GRID-
Arendal initiated a Blue Carbon Programme in 2011, and
has established itself as a Blue Carbon center of excel-
24.