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BENTHIC HABITATS BIODIVERSITY STATUS IN THE BULGARIAN BLACK SEA IN 2019 - CLASSIFICATION AND SPATIAL ASSESSMENT UNDER THE MARINE STRATEGY FRAMEWORK DIRECTIVE

Валентина Тодорова, Valentina Doncheva

Abstract

The Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) requires that biodiversity, structure and function of the marine ecosystems are safeguarded and benthic habitats, in particular, are not adversely affected by anthropogenic pressures. Evaluating the spatial and temporal variation of the benthic broad habitat types’ status in a six-year management cycle is mandatory under MSFD. The present study aims at assessing the benthic habitats status in the Bulgarian Black Sea shelf area in 2019. Benthic macrofauna diversity and abundance from the sediments at 97 monitoring sites were analysed to assess the habitats condition using the normalized multivariate marine biotic index M-AMBI(n), for which thresholds are established under the national marine monitoring programmes. This index is indicative of the cumulative impact from a range of anthropogenic pressures including eutrophication, pollution and physical disturbance on the seabed from fisheries. Areas with good and not good status were modelled from M-AMBI(n) point data using GIS tools. The resultant raster was intersected with a map of the broad habitats types and the spatial extent/proportion of each benthic habitat adversely affected was calculated in two assessment areas – the Northern shelf and the Southern shelf. The status of all representative habitat types in the Northern shelf was evaluated as “good”. In the Southern shelf two out of the four predominant habitat types – circalittoral and offshore circalittoral muds – were evaluated as “not good”. The results from this study are useful for fulfilling the national reporting obligations under MSFD for the management period 2018-2023.

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DOI resolver: doi.org/10.5593/sgem2021/3.1/s15.86

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