Dear MARMAM community,

We would like to draw your attention to the upcoming workshop "Taking stock of land-based, citizen science cetacean data sets: regional integration and analysis to deliver policy-relevant results" to be held in association with the World Marine Mammal Conference in Barcelona on Sunday 8th December, 2019.

The purpose of this workshop is to:

• Briefly review the range of data sets resulting from land-based citizen science programmes for cetacean monitoring;
• Critically assess the potential contribution of such data sets to cetacean monitoring needs, including the extent to which they complement other types of monitoring (e.g. boat surveys, acoustic monitoring), and their limitations;
• Critically assess how data from different surveys and areas could be brought together for combined analysis as well as possible applications of such analyses;
• Synthesise recommendations for ‘core’ data requirements to ensure that robust data sets for which future combined analysis is both achievable and useful; and
• Develop a roadmap to achieve better harmonized data collection and combined analysis.

We welcome participation from anyone involved or interested in collecting or using land-based cetacean sightings data. If you have specific suggestions or questions, please feel free to contact Dr. Graham Pierce (g.j.pierce@iim.csic.es) or myself (alice.walters@whales.org).

For more details, or to register, please see the information here:

https://www.wmmconference.org/workshops/#Taking%20stock%20of%20land-based,%20citizen%20science%20cetacean%20data%20sets:%20regional%20integration%20and%20analysis%20to%20delivery%20policy-relevant%20results

Best wishes

Alice Walters, Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) and

Dr. Graham Pierce, Instituto de Investigaciones Marinas (IMM)

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