The focus of the already on-going initiative is the identification, description, and mapping of benthic macrofauna communities, its habitats and functional features on a wide scale in the Baltic Sea.

A number of previously published works describe and map the benthic macrofauna communities in different sub-basins of the Baltic Sea. Nevertheless, no synthesis or joint data analyses have been done for the entire Baltic Sea region.

The project aims to compile an inventory of recent benthic macrofaunal communities throughout entire Baltic Sea, thereby adding to the investigation of living recourses in the ICES region. This development can serve as an evidence based advice for assessment of ecosystem status, be useful for environmental scientists to account for benthic macrofauna in  implementation of ecosystem approach and helpful for decision makers in marine spatial planning and fishery management.