The Pelagos network project is underway, bringing together marine protected areas and national parks included in the Cetacean Sanctuary, united for the protection of marine mammals in the era of climate change. The project involves 12 partners, starting from the Asinara National Park and the Portofino MPA, the island of Bergeggi, Cinque Terre, the Meloria shoals, the Tuscan Archipelago National Park, the La Maddalena National Park, the Capo Testa MPA and the Marine Protection Area of Capo Mortola, University of Pavia.
It sets the ambitious goal of strengthening the role of marine parks as sentinels of climate change and key players in the acoustic monitoring of the Sanctuary's species. In fact, the activity involves the positioning of fixed monitoring stations, both for the temperature of the water and for listening to the cetaceans through hydrophones, which will allow us to begin to understand the effects of the rise in temperature on the cetaceans and the impact of the noise on them. The protection of the seas and oceans represents the challenge and the objective to be achieved on a global scale. The Mediterranean basin has been identified as a climate-risk biodiversity hotspot, with sea temperatures rising more rapidly than other areas and with increasingly frequent marine heatwaves, droughts and coastal flooding. There is evidence that marine protected areas, if effectively managed, can represent nature-based solutions for climate adaptation, providing refuges and increasing the resilience of habitats and species to climate change. The more effective the protection, the better able organisms and ecosystems will be to cope and continue to support productive fisheries and other ecosystem services.
It has been proven that one whale can counteract the increase in global temperatures with an estimated average value, in terms of ecosystem services, of 2 million dollars. There is also talk of the "fertilizing effect" of whales, as, after feeding in depth, they return to the surface redistributing organic substance (nutrients such as iron and nitrogen) at the basis of primary production. A large whale absorbs an average of 33 tons of CO2.
In line with the 2030 agenda and the European Green Deal, the MPA and the Pelagos Parks have decided to engage in an active and concrete project to begin to understand the effects of these changes on the habits of marine mammals that frequent the more coastal areas. In 2019 the marine areas had signed a memorandum of understanding with the aim of increasing the protection and conservation actions of the Sanctuary for the protection of Pelagos marine mammals with particular reference to a greater involvement of the coastal municipalities that signed the Pelagos Partnership Charter. For the commissioner of the Asinara National Park Giovanni Cubeddu «the initiative represents a great opportunity for growth for the island also in relation to the initiatives that affect the vast area and therefore allows us to consolidate collaborations with the other protected areas of the north Sardinia and Corsica".
