SAON News

The 2nd Arctic Science Ministerial was held 26th October 2018 in Berlin.

Prior to the meeting, the Arctic Observing Summit Executive Committee, the EU Joint Research Centre and SAON had organised a side meeting with the title Towards a roadmap for coordinated Arctic Observing; approximately 80 people attended. Presentations are available here.

The Arctic Science Forum, held the day before the Ministerial meeting, had three themes:

  1. Strengthening, Integrating and Sustaining Arctic Observations, Facilitating Access to Arctic Data, and Sharing Arctic Research Infrastructure
  2. Understanding Regional and Global Dynamics of Arctic Changes
  3. Assessing Vulnerability and Building Resilience of Arctic Environments and Societies

In the draft statement from the ministerial meeting, SAON is mentioned (with others) in a context where ministers want to continue and expand the cooperation within the first theme by progressively moving from the design to the deployment phase of an integrated Arctic observing system which also supports and includes community-based observatories.

The report of the 2nd Arctic Science Ministerial is available here

Joint Statement of Ministers is available here

SAON has submitted an application to GEO for ArcticGEOSS.

www.arcticgeoss.info and www.arcticgeoss.net now point to www.arcticobserving.org

At the 4th AOS in June 2018, delegates from 26 countries focused on the "Business Case for a Pan-Arctic Observing System".
Demonstrating the value of Arctic observations, linked to relevant Societal Benefit Areas showed how long-term observing systems support decision-making from local to global scales.
The Conference Statement is found here:

At the request of the 10 parties negotiating on an agreement to prevent unregulated commercial fishing in the High Seas portion of the Central Arctic Ocean, participants at the meeting were tasked with addressing four Terms of Reference, summarized below:
1. Design a 1 ‐ 3 year long mapping program.
2. Design a monitoring program.
3. Identify human, financial, vessel/equipment resources needed for mapping and monitoring.
4. Develop data collection, sharing, and hosting protocols that outline the details of what and how data shall be collected, shared, and hosted for  consideration by the Parties.

Peter Pulsifer, chair of the Arctic Data Committee (ADC) has presented SAON and ADC work at the meeting.The full report is available here: https://www.afsc.noaa.gov/Arctic_fish_stocks_fifth_meeting/pdfs/Final_report_of_the_5th_FiSCAO_meeting.pdf

The application deadline is 15th September 2018 at 16:00 CEST: https://sios-svalbard.org/AccessCall2018

INTAROS has circulated this invitation:

I am now pleased to announce the opening of the INTAROS questionnaire to the external collaborators! You can access it through the INTAROS web page (www.intaros.eu).

This survey addresses Arctic in-situ observations of the ocean, atmosphere, terrestrial sphere and cryosphere, retrieved through established networks/observing systems as well as individual large projects.

Scope of the survey
To collect the information needed to assess the existing Arctic in-situ observing systems in terms of data delivery chain, accessibility, and spatial-temporal coverage.

Why is important?
The repository of the answers will enhance the visibility of the assessed data, and will facilitate data discovery for stakeholders and data users.

Roberta Pirazzini
PhD, Scientist
Meteorological Research Unit
Finnish Meteorological Institute
P.O. Box 503
FI-00101 Helsinki, Finland

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