The Ocean Decade was held in April in Barcelona and it represented the first in-person gathering of the Ocean Decade community with representatives of the scientific community, governments, NGOs and civil society, philanthropy, industry, and United Nations entities.

During the conference, several Satellite events took place. Among them, there was a round table to discuss the Urban coastal ecosystems restoration in the Mediterranean sea: Resilience of urban marine ecosystems, a dialogue between two decades, framed on the Satellite event: “Rising to the Ocean Decade challenges: a regional and city perspective”. This round table counted with the participation of representatives of Barcelona city council, Ancona Polytechnic University of Marche, Mersin’s Head of Climate change and Zero waste department and MedCities secretary. The results of the workshops led by Ocean Cities Network, ICM-CSIC and MedCities, held across the mediterranean cities of Barcelona, Ancona and Mersin, were exposed along with best practices. In addition, recommendations on Urban coastal ecosystem restoration in the mediterranean sea were presented, in alignment with the Barcelona Statement, released on April 12th, at the end of the conference. 

Simultaneously to this satellite event, at the Maritime museum of Barcelona another one was being held about Citizen science best practices. The MINKA platform as well as the BioMARató were explained, enhancing the BioMARató  as a tool to energize and obtain information from citizens who practice water sports. Along with these presentations, some Do It Yourself (DIY) tools were also shown to obtain environmental data, such as Kduino for water transparency or a device to record surface temperature while surfing, among others. The data obtained through these DIY devices will be soon incorporated into MINKA platform as Essential Ocean variables observations expanding its contribution on further SDGs.

Lastly, a poster exposing the citizen science observatory MINKA and its significant results in citizen science participation carried on by ANERIS, was also presented during the three days of the conference.