Towards modern, integrated, and effective fisheries monitoring, control and surveillance (MCS) systems

The grant opportunity HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-FARM2FORK-11 focuses on enhancing fisheries monitoring, control, and surveillance systems to promote sustainability and combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing. It is part of the Horizon Europe program, specifically under Cluster 6, which addresses issues relevant to food systems, bioeconomy, and environmental sustainability.

Eligible applicants include various entities such as research institutes, universities, small and medium-sized enterprises, public-private partnerships, and NGOs engaged in fisheries management and environmental conservation. Given the interdisciplinary nature of the project, consortiums involving multiple EU member states or associated countries are required.

The funding type is classified as a grant under Horizon Europe's Innovation Actions, with the anticipated funding amount estimated between €1 million and €5 million based on similar Horizon Europe grants. The application process consists of a single-stage submission, with a deadline of September 16, 2025. The grant expectations include a competitive environment, with success rates generally estimated between 10% and 39%.

The geographic eligibility primarily involves EU member states, European Economic Area countries, and EU-associated nations, while fostering international collaboration, particularly with the Indian and Pacific Ocean regions. Projects are expected to focus on the fisheries management sector, integrating modern technologies like artificial intelligence and ensuring compliance with principles such as FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) data.

Proposals should also include detailed plans on how to achieve improved data collection, better monitoring technologies, and innovative methods to address IUU fishing. The grant emphasizes cooperation among stakeholders, including fishers and policymakers, and encourages synergies with existing Horizon Europe initiatives. Successful proposals will contribute to the EU’s biodiversity strategy and the UN's 2030 Agenda, highlighting the need for sustainable practices in fisheries and aquaculture.

This is a summary of EU funding opportunities related to fisheries and aquaculture, specifically focusing on modernizing monitoring, control, and surveillance (MCS) systems. These opportunities are part of the Horizon Europe program, specifically Cluster 6, and aim to align with the Common Fisheries Policy, Data Collection Framework (DCF), revised Control Regulation, Farm to Fork strategy, EU Biodiversity Strategy, Marine Strategy Framework Directive, and the EU action plan for marine ecosystem protection. The overarching goal is to promote sustainable fisheries and aquaculture practices.

The expected outcomes of funded projects include:

Improved data collection for small-scale fisheries (SSF), recreational fisheries, and long-distance fisheries, encompassing position, catch data, and ecological impact assessments, while simultaneously reducing data collection and analysis costs.

Enhanced efficiency and cost-effectiveness in fisheries monitoring, surveillance, control, and enforcement technologies to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing practices in SSF, recreational fisheries, and long-distance fisheries.

Development of effective, real-time tools for monitoring fishing operations, including the implementation of technical measures, mitigation requirements for target, bycatch, and sensitive species, and data comparison between logbooks, landing declarations, and observer data.

Increased data collection resolution and exploration of interconnecting vessel tracking and e-logbooks to improve interoperability and expand their usage in SSF and long-distance fisheries.

Contribution to data standardization and harmonization of implementing procedures and quality control for data collection and processing, to improve fisheries management and the reliability of scientific advice.

Improved mechanisms for sharing fisheries-dependent data among fisheries management authorities and scientific advisory institutions.

Enhanced digital readiness of SSF, recreational fisheries, and long-distance fisheries through solutions like business models that encourage technology adoption and data sharing, distributing incentives and risks among stakeholders.

The scope of the funding opportunities includes:

Developing tools to identify patterns, anomalies, trends, and inconsistencies in electronic reporting to support effective fisheries monitoring, control, and surveillance, aligning with the revised Fisheries Control Regulation (EU Regulation 2023/2842).

Creating secure, tamper-resistant, accurate, and innovative vessel tracking systems tailored for different types of fisheries, especially small-scale fisheries, ensuring cost-effectiveness and ease of deployment and maintenance.

Developing strategies and tools for monitoring catch reporting by recreational fishers and estimating the ecological impact of recreational fisheries.

Utilizing innovative remote sensing technology and satellite imaging systems with automatic detection abilities to monitor fishing operations, complement data from fisheries observers, and combat IUU fishing.

Extending data collection to encompass SSF, recreational fisheries, and long-distance fisheries, enhancing MCS capabilities.

Developing and testing user-friendly technologies for these sectors, striving to reduce associated costs.

Devising innovative MCS methods to improve efficiency alongside advancements in remote monitoring and surveillance technologies.

Emphasizing technology development for automatic real-time data collection, including vessel monitoring systems (VMS) and other vessel tracking technologies.

Exploring opportunities for interconnecting vessel tracking position, electronic monitoring systems, and e-logbooks to enhance data resolution and expand their usage in SSF and long-distance fisheries.

Focusing on applications of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies for mining information and data from various monitoring technologies to support effective data collection, cross-verification, and compliance monitoring.

Including solutions to directly gather data from fishing activities, including data required under the DCF and for the Ecosystem Approach to Fisheries management.

Successful proposals should contribute to increasing the number of datasets in fisheries-dependent data, including non-commercial species and discards, while ensuring data collection standardization and harmonization of processes and methods for small-scale fisheries data collection.

Integrated Approach and Case Studies:

Proposals should take an integrated approach, encompassing the development of new fisheries monitoring and data collection and analysis for SSF, recreational fisheries, and long-distance fisheries.

Funded projects should showcase expected outcomes through four case studies:

EU SSF in European Seas (Mediterranean Sea, Baltic Sea, Black Sea, or North East Atlantic).

EU SSF in EU Outermost Regions.

Recreational fisheries in EU waters.

EU long-distance fisheries in the Indian Ocean or the Pacific Ocean.

Additional case studies can be included.

Involvement of Stakeholders:

Proposals should include the involvement of fishers, other relevant actors, including citizens, and end-users in all stages, from conceptual development to implementation.

Cooperation and Synergies:

Cooperation with the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) is encouraged, with potential JRC participation involving the provision and/or analysis of fisheries data.

Proposals should consider the 2024 recommendations provided by the Strategic Working group on Fisheries and Aquaculture Research (SCAR-Fish).

Proposals should allocate specific tasks and resources to link with relevant Horizon Europe projects, such as Fish-X, EveryFish, and OptiFish, and projects on the Digital Twin Ocean such as SURIMI and SEADITO, as well as projects focusing on observing and mapping biodiversity coastal and marine ecosystems, such as OBAMA-NEXT, MARCO-BOLO and DiverSea and other biodiversity projects such as B-USEFUL.

Data Management:

Efforts should be made to ensure that the data produced is FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Re-usable).

Data should become available through the European Marine Observation and Data network, ensuring their further availability for fisheries management applications through the EU Digital Twin Ocean core infrastructure (EDITO).

Proposals should leverage data and services available through European Research Infrastructures federated under the European Open Science Cloud, as well as data from relevant data spaces.

The call includes various topics with different types of actions and budget allocations:

HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-CLIMATE-01 to -05: Focus on climate-related research and innovation actions, including co-fund actions.

HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-COMMUNITIES-01 to -04: Focus on community-related research and innovation actions.

HORIZON-CL6-2025-02-FARM2FORK-01 to -17: Focus on farm-to-fork related research, innovation, coordination, and support actions, including co-fund actions.

Each topic has a specific budget, indicative number of grants, opening date (May 6, 2025), and deadline (September 16, 2025). The indicative budgets for each topic range from 2,000,000 EUR to 50,000,000 EUR.

General conditions for participation include admissibility conditions, eligible countries, financial and operational capacity, exclusion criteria, and legal and financial setup, as detailed in the Horizon Europe Work Programme General Annexes. Specific conditions are described in the specific topic of the Work Programme.

Application and evaluation forms, model grant agreements, and additional guidance documents are available on the Funding & Tenders Portal.

In summary, this funding opportunity aims to modernize fisheries monitoring, control, and surveillance systems through research, innovation, and the application of advanced technologies, aligning with EU policies and international goals for sustainable fisheries and aquaculture. It encourages collaboration, data sharing, and the involvement of stakeholders to improve data collection, combat IUU fishing, and enhance the digital readiness of the fisheries sector.

Eligible Applicant Types: The eligible applicant types are not explicitly defined in the provided text. However, based on the nature of Horizon Europe calls, eligible applicants could include universities, research institutes, SMEs, large enterprises, NGOs, governmental organizations, and other legal entities capable of conducting research and innovation activities. The Joint Research Centre (JRC) may participate as a member of the consortium selected for funding.

Funding Type: The funding types include HORIZON Research and Innovation Actions (HORIZON-RIA), HORIZON Innovation Actions (HORIZON-IA), and HORIZON Programme Cofund Actions (HORIZON-COFUND). These are primarily grant-based mechanisms. HORIZON-RIA focuses on research and development, HORIZON-IA focuses on innovation and market uptake, and HORIZON-COFUND involves co-funding from other sources.

Consortium Requirement: The opportunity generally requires a consortium, as indicated by the encouragement of cooperation with the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and the need for specific tasks and resources to link with other Horizon Europe projects. The Joint Research Centre (JRC) may participate as member of the consortium selected for funding.

Beneficiary Scope (Geographic Eligibility): The geographic eligibility is primarily focused on EU member states and associated countries within the Horizon Europe framework. A number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon Europe projects.

Target Sector: The program targets the following sectors: agriculture/food, climate, environment, fisheries, aquaculture, ICT, space, and innovation. Specifically, it focuses on sustainable fisheries and aquaculture, data collection, fisheries monitoring, surveillance, control, enforcement technologies, remote sensing technology, satellite imaging systems, and artificial intelligence.

Mentioned Countries: The opportunity focuses on the European Union, including EU member states and associated countries. There is also mention of EU fleets operating beyond EU waters, including international waters and waters subject to the sovereignty or jurisdiction of third countries, particularly in the context of Sustainable Fisheries Partnership Agreements. EU Outermost Regions are also mentioned.

Project Stage: The project stages include research, development, validation, demonstration, and innovation. The HORIZON-RIA actions focus on research and development, while HORIZON-IA actions focus on innovation and market uptake.

Funding Amount: The funding amounts vary depending on the specific topic and type of action. The indicative budgets for the topics range from €2,000,000 to €50,000,000. The indicative number of grants per topic ranges from 1 to 3, except for the co-fund actions, which may have only 1 grant.

Application Type: The application type is an open call, with a single-stage submission process.

Nature of Support: The beneficiaries will receive money in the form of grants to support their research, innovation, and coordination activities.

Application Stages: The application process involves a single stage, as indicated by the "single-stage" designation for all topics.

Success Rates: The success rates are not explicitly mentioned, but the indicative number of grants per topic provides some insight. For most topics, the indicative number of grants is 1 or 2, suggesting a competitive process with a success rate likely below 40%.

Co-funding Requirement: The HORIZON-COFUND actions require co-funding from other sources, as indicated by the nature of the funding mechanism. The other actions do not explicitly mention a co-funding requirement, but leveraging other resources and synergies is generally encouraged in Horizon Europe projects.

Summary: This Horizon Europe Cluster 6 call focuses on "Towards modern, integrated, and effective fisheries monitoring, control and surveillance (MCS) systems." It aims to improve data collection, enhance monitoring and surveillance technologies, and combat illegal fishing practices in small-scale, recreational, and long-distance fisheries. The call includes various topics under the Climate, Communities, and Farm to Fork destinations, with funding instruments such as Research and Innovation Actions (RIA), Innovation Actions (IA), and Co-fund Actions (COFUND). Applicants are expected to form consortia and involve relevant stakeholders, including fishers, policymakers, and scientists. The projects should contribute to the UN 2030 Agenda and the EU's biodiversity strategy, promoting sustainable fisheries and aquaculture. The funding ranges from 2 million to 50 million EUR depending on the type of action. The application process is a single-stage open call with a deadline of September 16, 2025.