Theme 3 Sustainability between conservation, restoration, exploitation and use

The Iroise Sea and the Bay of Brest are particularly rich environments in terms of biodiversity. These territories are also marked by strong heritage elements. This biological and cultural richness has always provided human populations with many key ecosystem services. The major species and habitats that have shaped the maritime history of this territory are currently threatened by increasing anthropic pressures (habitat degradation, water pollution, epizootics, climate change, invasive species, etc.).

Within the ZABrI, two natural parks are in charge of managing this natural heritage: for the Iroise Sea, the Iroise Marine Natural Park and for the Bay of Brest, the Armorique Regional Nature Park and its NATURA 2000 maritime and terrestrial zone. In this context, theme 3, focuses on a major scientific and societal issue: How can we reconcile conservation, or even ecological restoration, with the sustainable use of marine resources?

In order to meet the challenges of sustainability, theme 3 is based on a dozen "flagship" projects that study few emblematic species and habitats and bring together biologists, geographers, economists, managers and professionals from the sea. In addition to this work, recurrent and essential monitoring of biodiversity is carried out within the framework of several observatories or environmental observation networks (REBENT, DCE, DCSMM, IUEM observatory, shellfish observatories). The approaches used are both human and natural sciences (surveys, mapping, sampling at sea and laboratory analyses).

The emblematic species and habitats studied in this theme are the following:

• the benthic habitats with priority issues (Maerl beds, eelgrass beds, boulder fields, kelp forests, biogenic oyster and mussel reefs);
• the populations ofbenthic invertebrates (scallops, black scallops, prawns, abalone, lobsters);
• species of fish and marine mammals (sea bass, small pelagics, bottlenose dolphins, seals);
• the colonies ofseabirds and waders protected species (great grey heron, common oystercatcher, turnstone, curlew, shearwater);
• the high value terrestrial habitats (heaths and coastal grasslands).