The World Ocean Council (WOC) and EU-PolarNet cooperated on a joint project to reach out to the polar and ocean businesses community to identify opportunities to collaborate on data collection in support of improved science and sustainable development.
EU-PolarNet is the worlds largest consortium of expertise and infrastructure for polar research, representing 22 research institutions from 17 European countries, supported by Horizon 2020. The WOC is the EU-PolarNet industry partner, working to foster and facilitate private sector interaction with the polar research community.
The Project
Expanding the scope and scale of polar ocean and atmosphere observations is essential toimproved understanding, modelling, and predicting of conditions in these areas. This will inturn reduce risks to industries operating in polar areas.
There are important opportunities for science and industry to collaborate in the use of ships of opportunity to facilitate data collection and achieve the mutual benefits of increased and improved information from polar areas. The present survey builds on the discussions on Polar Region Sustainable Development: Business and Science Collaboration in the Arctic and Antarctic at the recent WOC Sustainable Ocean Summit (SOS). The survey also contributes to the WOC Smart Ocean-Smart Industries program, which is working to systematically scale up industry involvement in data collection worldwide.
Survey Outreach Sum Up
• Launched 12th December 2016
• Closed 24th March 2017
• 67 responses
Survey outreach channels:
• 35,000 persons were reached through WOC News Release (12/12/2016)
• +500 persons were reached through WOC social media platforms (from 12/12/2016 to 31/02/2017)
Project Results
The survey showed good results.
• 43 respondents added precise information about the boats they operate, their characteristics and their qualities.
• 41 respondents indicated their routes in the polar regions and the seasons, allowing us to follow them closely.
• 29 respondents indicated some contacts for further collaboration.
The survey has largely gathered information on collaboration between the business community and the scientific community regarding data collection in Polar Regions. It has established the first contact in a larger interaction between industry and research for an efficient use of research project. It represents a unique opportunity to switch research budgets normally allocated to material to an efficient data collection based on collaboration, leading to a reduced need for infrastructure and a better use of the current resources.
This was a crucial step to develop fruitful collaborations and positive word-of-mouth in the Polar business community. The upcoming cooperation should be successful to enable the scientific community to further reach out to the industry and enhance the dialogue.