First and Second Interim Reports of the Working Group on Ecosystem Assessment of Western European Shelf Seas (WGEAWESS)

The Working Group on Ecosystem Assessment of Western European Shelf Seas (WGEAWESS) met in Cadiz, Spain, from 9–13 March 2015. Under our three year Terms of reference, this was the second year. However, work in 2014 was by correspondence, and so is reported together with the 2015 meeting in this report.Under WGEAWESS three-year terms of reference, the activity in the first year focused on cataloguing the datasets available that would be potentially valuable in an IEA. Metadata and descriptions were compiled into a series of databases by ecoregion and sub region. An important element was the identification of the main sector/human ac-tivity links to pressures imposed, and identifying pressure state relationships. Full ODEMM metadata compilations have been developed for the Celtic Seas, and for the Bay of Biscay, and the main data have also been compiled for the other subregions in Iberian waters. Examples of the metadata compilation exercise are provided under Sec-tion 4.