REBORN

Seagrass meadows once provided millions in ecosystem services across NWE coastlines (e.g. CO2 sinks, fisheries support). However, today over 50,000 ha of NWE meadows are degraded and suitable for restoration - an unparalleled natural capital opportunity for the region (up to 10M CO2 tonnes, > €85M in economic value). 

Recent policy developments (e.g. EU Nature Restoration Law, NRL) set ambitious binding targets to restore 60% of degraded ecosystems by 2040, including seagrasses. This requires an urgent mobilisation of a wide range of actors and resources (€20 B annually) for an unprecedented scale of action the region is still not ready for (EC, 2023). 

While a handful of pioneering seagrass restoration actions exist, cooperation among them is ad-hoc and limited in extent (<1 ha), and approaches are mainly limited to research, failing to incorporate promising interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral innovations and collaborations. Transnational coordination between authorities and the wider ocean community (e.g. scientists, businesses) is also lagging. These factors impede the large-scale, coordinated action needed to achieve EU targets. 

REBORN unlocks seagrass restoration at scale (>1 ha) in NWE for biodiversity and natural capital gains by simultaneously driving seagrass-related governance, practice and capacity-building. It brings together an interdisciplinary consortium of 11 partners in restoration practice and science, smart data collection, natural capital, stakeholder engagement, governance and policy to: 

1. Drive long-term seagrass restoration governance and policy change in NWE through a multi-actor community of >30 organisations. 
2. Test a novel restoration model in ~15 ha in collaboration with 250 community members and facilitate its uptake to up to 50,000 ha across NWE. 
3. Increase the capacity of 40 organisations (practitioners, community members, businesses, policy makers) as seagrass restoration ambassadors through tailored capacity building modules.