ICES/OSPAR/HELCOM Steering Group on Quality Assurance of Biological Measurements [STGQAB]

The STGQAB met between the 14th and 16th February 2006 at ICES headquarters in Copenhagen, Denmark. Eleven members from 8 countries participated in the meeting. Please see ANNEX 4 for a summary list of the proposed recommendations. The group reviewed documents concerning guidelines for phyto-, zoo- and bacterioplankton of the HELCOM COMBINE manual. It was proposed that bacterioplankton guidelines should be adopted by HELCOM MONAS, while some additional work on phyto- and zooplankton guidelines were recommended before adoption. A proposal for the revision of current data validation guidelines was also considered and work planned to be performed within the group during 2006. A presentation of BEQUALM was made by a representative of that organization and recommendation for future interaction suggested. No clear requests concerning OSPAR EcoQO´s and OSPAR JAMP products had been presented to the group. Current group members also lacked insight into these subjects. Contribution to these items was therefore limited. The steering group agreed in the future to take on an extended responsibility, in addition to theAQC previously considered. This included consideration of the natural variability of environmental analysis, an important source of variation in biological data. It is recommended to recruit additional members, with engagement in the OSPAR area to the group, in order to better support quality assurance issues in this organization. Competence of marine birds, fish and biological effects measurements should be considered in this context.