Information about the future of marine nature belongs to all

The information produced by ECOnnect will not only remain among the experts, but an information package for the general public will also be published towards the end of the project. Working with this package and other ECOnnect communication is Piia Orava, who is specialist at Metsähallitus, Parks and Wildlife Finland.

Understand the future through a story

In practice, the information package takes the form of a story map. It is a narrative or storytelling website, where texts, pictures, videos, and animations submerge you into the Gulf of Bothnia. The story dives into the future of marine species, habitats and environmental conditions. Intertwined in the story we have the human perspective and what we can do for our sea. Piia describes the story map as follows:

“Our aim is that each visitor in the story map will get a picture of what the marine nature might look like in 100 years within the Gulf of Bothnia. Also, it does not hurt if one’s understanding of the importance of marine nature deepens at the same time!”

One of the themes in the story map will be the sea’s essential ecosystem services, which we introduced in our last news. Their future is visualised and brought closer to the viewer with an animation. And since fish are one of the most apparent services for us provided by the sea, ECOnnect deepened this perspective and filmed local fishermen on the ice of the Gulf of Bothnia. We had interesting conversations with them about the changes they have noticed in their catches and marine environment over the course of years.

Popularising science is pop

Like with the fishermen, ECOnnect is all about dialogue between different specialists. This is why Piia also feels like a good addition to the project team:

“As a person who is not an expert in the field of marine research, I tend to pick up things that I do not fully understand. And it is through these discussions we can popularise our communication.”

Get to know our communicator

As she is a nature person, the dive from forests and mires into the depths of marine nature has been a pleasant one for Piia – although boating at sea still gives her shivers at times. For her, the most inspiring things in ECOnnect are communicating and understanding marine nature. Piia has done her masters at the University of Vaasa, where she studied English and communication.