D2.1 The role of citizen science within WFD and SDGs, and how to incentivize the collaboration with environmental regulators

This work is part of OTTERS - citizen science for water stewardship - WP2 "Deepening understanding of the effectiveness of citizen science campaigns in marine and freshwater domains".

Please contact Steven Loiselle at steven.loiselle@unisi.it for any inquiries about the present work.

Task 2.1 states the foollowing: The large body of EU projects and programs with citizen science experience as well as recent publications on the topic will be surveyed to identify insights, lessons learned, and knowledge gaps with respect to the three broad issues outlined in the WP Objectives section above. The review will focus on identifying factors that can contribute to greater
effectiveness of CS in participatory researchers and innovation. It will see if there are novel ways in which CS can
contribute to such research. The project and literature survey will also focus on understanding how much we know and
understand (and gaps in knowledge) about the effectiveness of CS in changing behaviour of people (esp., young ones)
toward more marine and freshwater ecosystems. Does engaging in CS increase ocean literacy and agency? Does it make
people behave more responsibly? What evidence is cited for such behavioural change? Finally, the project and literature
survey will look into experiences, opportunities, and challenges of engaging special stakeholders. The reviews will be
summarised into 3 draft white papers.

The present work explores the state of the art and the opportunities for citizen science to achieve WFD and SDGs goals, as well as the levers for a stronger collaboration between citizen science programmes and regulatory agencies at a national and subnational basis. The present study was based on a thorough analysis of international and national scientific literature and databases. While the focus is on the current state of the art, the authors also explore current opportunities to increase the impact of freshwater citizen science and potential obstacles.