Ana Margarida Ferreira 1, 2, Jorge Freire 1, 3, 4, Pedro Antão 1, Joana Balsemão 1
1 Cascais Municipality, Praça 5 de Outubro 1, 2750-320 Cascais, Portugal
2 Marine and Environmental Sciences Center, Department of Life Sciences, Calçada Martim de Freitas, University of Coimbra, 3000-456 Coimbra, Portugal
3 Center for the Humanities, 1069 Lisboa, Portugal
4 Portuguese Navy Research Center, Almada, Portugal
The Kelp Forest restauration project is inserted in Cascais Sea Municipal Strategy. This local strategy seeks the sustainable development of the sea’s economic activities, promoting equality marine biodiversity and conservation of its historic patrimony. These objectives are supported by a vast scientific knowledge. The strategic decisions and consequent project development are dependent on this knowledge raised by the Municipality with its academic partners. Along with its technical-scientific dimension the Seas Municipal Strategy is based on a good governance structure by its Sea Municipal Council, composed with more than 40 entities represented by central government, local stakeholders, Academia and NGOs.
Kelp forests have always been a part of Cascais Sea landscape, being very common in some beaches and dearly remembered by the ancient fisherman or sailors. The Seaweed populations started to decrease in the 80’s due to unknown causes. To restore the old Kelp Forests in Cascais Sea, the Municipality started to test the “green gravel” methodology in different deployment sites with the SeaForest Association and in 2022 started to test transplants from adult individuals, these projects had funding from the EEA Grants Mechanism. It is expected by the end of 2022 to have a demonstrator artificial reef unit near the transplant sites, where new kelp restauration methodologies will be tested. In a few years the Municipality expects a larger abundance in fish, with greater income for the local fisherman, a return of seaweeds to the beaches and an increase of nautical tourism (namely divers to visit the underwater forests).