Last week, marine reforestation activities began the coast of the Natura 2000 site in Qawra, Malta, led by the Italian team from the MEDSEA Foundation, a non-profit organisation dedicated to protecting marine and coastal ecosystems in the Mediterranean. This is the first project in the Maltese State focused on marine reforestation to support the natural restoration of Posidonia oceanica meadows in areas – surveyed this summer – that show signs of degradation, primarily due to recreational boating.
Around 2,400 cuttings, selected and collected solely from naturally uprooted plants, will be planted across approximately 200m² of degraded surface within a one-hectare area at a depth of 6 metres along the Qawra coast. Dr Francesca Frau is the MEDSEA project coordinator and a marine biologist.
Coordinated by the MEDSEA Foundation, which operates from its headquarters in Cagliari, Sardinia (IT), the project benefits from collaboration with Fondation de la Mer (FdM), a private French foundation based in Paris that promotes biodiversity protection programs in the Mediterranean.
The project is locally supported by the University of Malta through staff (Prof. Alan Deidun, Dr Adam Gauci, Mr Alessio Marrone, Ms Audrey Zammit) within the Oceanography Malta Research Group (OMRG), Department of Geosciences, Faculty of Science – and has been authorised by the Environment and Resources Authority (ERA), Malta’s environmental authority, as a restoration and conservation activity aimed at protecting Malta’s marine ecosystem.
The financial partner of the initiative is CMA CGM S.A., one of the world’s largest maritime transport companies, headquartered in Marseille, which supports conservation and restoration activities throughout the Mediterranean. As part of its marine ecosystem restoration projects, the shipping company entrusted the French Foundation with managing several marine meadow restoration projects in the Mediterranean. In turn, Fondation de la Mer tasked MEDSEA with implementing these initiatives, conducting interventions in both Malta and Sardinia, in the Capo Carbonara Marine Protected Area.
Posidonia oceanica meadows, an endemic Mediterranean species, represent a priority habitat that fulfils numerous essential ecosystem functions, including regulating seawater acidity, producing oxygen, capturing COâ‚‚, providing shelter for numerous marine organisms, and protecting coastlines from erosion. This habitat, often threatened and damaged by human activities such as recreational boating and illegal trawling, is in regression across the Mediterranean.
Marine biologist Prof. Alan Deidun, Malta’s Ocean Ambassador and resident academic, hailed this landmark first attempt within Maltese waters of restoring lost P. oceanica seagrass meadows as a milestone in local environmental management efforts. Prof. Deidun also expressed his hope that this investment in marine restoration would be safeguarded against any form of human disturbance (e.g. anchoring) so as to enable the recovery of the transplanted seagrass meadow patches.
