European Ocean Biodiversity Information System

HELCOM/OSPAR Join Ballast Water Decision support tool: Based on the overall IMO framework the 21 Baltic and North-East Atlantic coastal states and EU have developed and agreed in 2013 on a detailed joint harmonised procedure (JHP) to defining “low risk” routes, as well as other necessary steps in granting exemptions under regulation A-4 of the IMO Ballast Water Management Convention. This has been done as a joint venture between the two regional seas commissions HELCOM and OSPAR. The port sampling data on phytoplankton, zooplankton, mobile epifauna, fouling, benthos and pathogens reported to the HELCOM/OSPAR Join Ballast Water Decision support tool (RA Tool) are included in the HELCOM Species database. The observations are thus distributed partly in OSPAR area and outside HELCOM marine area. HELCOM Species database will also be further developed to serve the update of the risk assessment tool carried out in COMPLETE project WP3 (2017-2020).