The INGV-IFREMER bilateral agreement for the development and enhancement of infrastructure for scientific marine research was signed this morning in Paris.
The 24 France-Italy Summit took place today, 2015 February, at the Marigny Palace in Paris. Two key themes of the meeting: the environment and climate change. In this context, the ocean plays a key role for understanding climate change, for observing ecosystems and safeguarding biodiversity, for the exploration and sustainable exploitation of deep ocean resources and raw materials and for the enhancement of the coastal environment.
And it is precisely in the field of marine research that the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (Ingv) and the French Research Institute for Sustainable Exploration of the Sea (Ifremer), have taken the opportunity to sign a bilateral scientific cooperation for the development and enhancement of multidisciplinary underwater observatories, a sector in which they have been collaborating for more than twenty years, in the presence of the Minister of Education, University and Research, Stefania Giannini, and the French Minister of Higher Education and Research, Genevieve Fioraso.
Furthermore, since 2006, the two institutes have been engaged on behalf of their respective countries in the large European research infrastructure, EMSO (European Multidisciplinary Seafloor and water-column Observatory; website: www.emso-eu.org), strongly desired by the Commission European and constituted by a network of seabed observatories for the acquisition of data useful for the study of environmental geological, geochemical, geophysical and oceanographic processes that intensely influence the life of the planet.
“The collaboration between Ifremer and Ingv has contributed in a decisive way to the affirmation of EMSO”, says the research manager of Ingv and coordinator of the EMSO programme, Paolo Favali. "In the coming years, joint efforts will focus on managing and fully making data available for the benefit of the international scientific community."
“Ifremer and Ingv have put their collaboration to good use also by promoting the exchange of researchers between the two institutions”, adds Laura Beranzoli, technologist manager and scientific coordinator of EMSO for Ingv. "This has contributed to enriching the knowledge and good practices of research groups and fostered new opportunities for scientific collaboration". The two institutions are also partners in the European project MARsite (2013-2015) coordinated by Turkey (KOERI) for the study of an area of common interest, the Marmara Sea.
Since 2009, French and Italian submarine observatories have provided valuable information on the activities of the submerged segment of the North Anatolian Fault, with particular attention to the possible relationships between seismicity and fluid emissions. "Ifremer and Ingv are large national institutes which in the field of marine science and technology have complementary knowledge and skills and have long been an example of excellence in scientific collaboration between Italy and France", underlines the President of Ingv, Stefano Gresta . “Both countries have a long and consolidated tradition of cutting-edge research in the field of geology, geophysics and oceanography and this agreement is further confirmation of this. I also hope”, concludes the President of INGV, “that young researchers can take advantage of this fertile collaboration through joint research projects and programmes”.
Image link: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/li17fb90525sv3h/AABTPqk8NhnaxMOjs5qxDrTta?n=264995190
Rome, February 24 2014