There is a need to include the biosphere into our forecasts of a sustainable blue economy and move beyond the dominant single-use and single-sector paradigm. This demands a move towards approaches that can facilitate the combination of activities for multiple social, economic and environmental gains.
Multifunctional planning is highlighted in both research (Przedrzymirska et al., 2021) as well as in national policy (HaV, 2020; Miljömålsbereddningen 2020; Nyström Sandman et al., 2020) and local management (Schubert et al., 2018) as a potential planning mechanism to ensure more sustainable marine practices. Multifunctional planning through co-use, coexistence, or co-location of activities and resources offers a way out of the silo paradigm (Schupp et al., 2019). Multifunctionality is closely related to the ecosystem approach through a systems perspective. However, multifunctionality goes beyond landscape traits to also incorporate human-made artifacts, value chains and services (Barquet & Green, 2022).
Marine spatial planning provides a clear entry point to operationalize multifunctionality, in that it is foreseen to help optimize ‘the use of marine space to benefit economic development and the marine environment’ (European Commission, 2008). It is closely related to resource-sharing, which makes it an important instrument of circular economy, and has therefore received increased attention and support from the EU Commission (though still absent in the Marine Framework Directive).
An important part of multifunctionality is the shift away from sectoral goals towards a mission-oriented approach (European Commission, nd). This demands a shift in focus from ad hoc investments, such as single purpose infrastructure, towards actions that are steered towards transformational changes – such as the development of new general-purpose and cross-sectoral solutions (Mazzucato, 2016). C2B2 will pave the way by demonstrating how this can be done in practice.
Contact persons
Andrea Morf
