What We Do

SmartNet will support and leverage ICES/PICES member countries’ activities related to the Ocean Decade, by emphasising areas of mutual research interest, including climate change, fisheries and ecosystem-based management, social, ecological and environmental dynamics of marine systems, coastal communities and human dimensions. It also incorporates strategies to facilitate the Ocean Decade’s cross-cutting inclusivity themes relating to gender equality, early career engagement, and involvement of indigenous communities and developing nations in the planning and implementation of joint activities. See SmartNet Fact Sheet and Phase II Implementation Plan for the details.

Illustration by Bass Kohler from the SmartNet ‘Ocean We Want Survey’ side event at the UN Ocean Decade Conference in Barcelona, Spain, April 2024.

SmartNet Strategic Framework

SmartNet operates within our strategic framework and is guided by four action pillars:

• Knowledge production
• Knowledge sharing
• Networking with Ocean Decade Actions
• Engagement with diverse communities, as outlined in our Implementation Plan

Knowledge production comprises the ICES and PICES scientific enterprise and leverages collective organizational infrastructure to advance key scientific topics in marine science. This is exemplified by joint ICES-PICES Expert Groups such as those focused on climate change effects on marine ecosystems (ICES SICCME, PICES S-CCME); impacts of warming on growth rates and fisheries yield (ICES WGGRAFY, PICES WG-45); and sustainable pelagic forage communities (CES WGSPF, PICES WG-53). SmartNet facilitates the creation of new joint Expert Groups to address emerging challenges and priorities throughout the Ocean Decade.

Knowledge sharing leverages the organizational and scientific infrastructure of ICES and PICES, with scientific information communicated through jointly sponsored meetings (ICES/PICES Annual Meetings and International Symposia) and publications. In addition to the dissemination of scientific knowledge and products, SmartNet works with Expert Groups to facilitate dissemination of data through Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable (FAIR) principles (e.g. PICES Technical Committee on Data Exchange, TCODE, aims to establish dialogue to support the Ocean Decade, in particular, its societal outcome of a “transparent and accessible ocean”; similarly for the ICES Data Science and Technology Steering Group, DSTSG).

Networking fulfils the key SmartNet objective of creating a functioning Global Knowledge Network (GKN) to generate scientific knowledge and share capacity around marine ecosystem sustainability. The long history of ICES and PICES partnerships with national, international and inter-governmental organizations provides the foundation for this GKN, which SmartNet will expand beyond the Convention Areas of the North Atlantic and North Pacific represented by ICES and PICES, respectively. SmartNet identifies new partners and expands the knowledge network to the Global South, to least developed countries (LDCs) and to Small Island Developing States (SIDS). The Ocean Decade provides new networking opportunities amongst Decade-endorsed Programmes and Projects which encompass Communities of Practice around key themes.

Engagement focuses on the cross-cutting Ocean Decade objectives of empowering diverse communities, ensuring geographic and gender equity in knowledge generation and capacity sharing, facilitating the career development of ECOPs with the ICES and PICES ECOP groups as the major actors (SIIECS and AP-ECOP), and incorporating local and traditional forms of knowledge. By striving for global equity in the generation and sharing of scientific knowledge and implementation of ocean solutions, this element of the Ocean Decade has the potential to be most transformative. SmartNet actively pursues these cross-cutting themes through developing and sharing capacity with new partners.