The project runs during the period 1 February 2010 to 1 February 2014.

Managing ecosystems
Management of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems is legally defined in a number of European Directives. The current scientific basis for implementing the directives is limited by a lack of knowledge on the interplay between agriculture, fishery, environmental qualities in all surface waters and the welfare economic consequences, as well as by insufficient models, deficiencies in terms of uncertainties, local and regional aspects.

Integrating models
The strategic alliance MAFIA focuses on integration of knowledge and models of land use in drainage basins, transport of nutrients to water bodies, biogeochemistry in freshwater and in marine ecosystems, fishery models and welfare economic models as a basis for the development of novel integrated ecosystem-based management models.

MAFIA will integrate and train new researchers and private and public end-users to develop and work with a number of empirical and process-based models and management tools, further developed into integrated management models cross traditional media and science-based decision support systems, to strengthen national and international environmental management.

Participating researchers
The MAFIA team includes a number of internationally well-recognized scientists and the involved institutions have a profound experience and significant international collaboration.

• Aarhus universitet, Danmarks Miljøundersøgelser, Baltic Nest Institute, Denmark
• Danmarks Tekniske Universitet, DTU AQUA, Denmark
• University of Copenhagen, (FOI), LIFE, KU, Denmark
• Syddansk Universitet, SDU, Denmark
• Stockholms University, Baltic Nest Institute, Sweden
• MTT Economic Research, MTT, Finland
• Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, SMHI, Sweden
• DHI Danmark, DHI, Denmark
• Texas A&M University System, Texas A&M, USA
• Enveco, Environmental Economics Consultancy, Enveco, Sweden

More information can be found on the MAFIA home page.