“Mare nelle Città” citizen scienze experience

Ancona city is very close to the topics addressed by the Mission Ocean & waters and organises events to promote citizen science among different local authors (citizens, NGOs, diving centres, researchers, among others). The city organises several Ocean Cities Network (OCNet) conferences by gathering different researchers and stakeholders who exposed their point of view regarding the threats, challenges and opportunities faced by our seas and in relation with the protection and restoration of urban marine ecosystems.

The conferences serve also to explain the potentialities of the citizen science as a tool of continuous monitoring of sea species, to increase awareness, the sense of belonging of the population and bring the seas and the life they hold closer to the citizens.

In order to reach stakeholders that could act as future enablers for the promotion of citizen science and the monitoring of the littoral of Marche region, many other conferences and workshops are organised. As a result of the activity and the interest of some of the stakeholders, a collaboration between the project and a company from the tourism, recreational and environmental awareness sector has started in order to create a project to collect their observations in the southern region of the Marche. The project aims at linking the tourism and recreational activities together with the need to protect our seas, our beaches and engage more citizens and students.

The intention is to replicate the activity in different Italian coastal areas in order to increase the available data on marine biodiversity, promote citizen science and increase citizen knowledge regarding the littoral biodiversity