iSea

Partner Description: iSea is a NGO, founded in 2016. The overall aim of iSea is to preserve, protect and restore the precious and unique heritage of the natural aquatic environment. The organization activities focus on the following four pillars: alien/invasive species, aquatic litter, the relation between humans and aquatic ecosystems and fisheries. iSea bases its activities on different tools varying from scientific research to citizen science and environmental education and awareness, in order to achieve its goals concerning the protection of aquatic ecosystems through the sensitization of the state, managers and public opinion, to take action when and where is a necessity, the information on the negative impacts of climate change on aquatic ecosystems and the promotion of sustainable development, based on technical expertise and striving for social, economic, and environmental welfare. iSea’s personnel and colleagues vary from marine biologists, to specialists in environmental management and educators with the aim to shed light on the foremost issues affecting our oceans and propose alternatives for a sustainable future. The expanded network of iSea collaborators includes University Departments, Mediterranean organisations, local associations and research institutes. The funding sources of iSea mainly come from European and Greek Ministry funds, private foundations and corporates in the contexts of Corporate Social Responsibility. Currently, iSea numbers 5 full time and 3 external employees and 20 trained volunteers who are actively involved in different activities. Environmental education activities of iSea focus on enriching the knowledge of the public on marine environment and develop pro-environmental attitudes through school visits, educational events throughout Greece.

Role in The Project: The NGO iSea will be involved as a Programme Country Institution in the RiskMan Project. The specific role of iSea will be to lead the WP 5 (Development - Development of Tailored Course for Different Target Groups), organize the Tailored courses for refugees in Greece and the meeting that will take care in Thessaloniki with and the Consortium staff and related stakeholders (fishers, aquaculture employees, representatives of public and private institutions). In addition, iSea will be involved in all the other WP in order to support the close Partner Countries of Western Balkan in the capacity building project for establishment of a Citizen science network for monitoring and collection of data on NN aquatic species. Together with Ekomenlog, iSea will have a crucial role in the implementation of the online platform summarizing the status of NN species occurrence on Partner Countries.