European Member states have become increasingly aware of the need to fill gaps in preparedness affecting wildlife, but although some operate an oiled wildlife response plan and the expertise to deal with live oiled animals in their home countries, the operational standards that would enable countries to pool this expertise together and make it internationally available across Europe are lacking.

To assist in filling this gap, the EUROWA network was created to provide international expert resources for dealing with affected animals in marine wildlife emergencies. The initiative was established in 2015-2016 via an EU-funded project, but preceded by many years of informal cooperation between European oiled wildlife responders pooling their expertise and collaborating on developing joint preparedness and response standards.

Explore more of Eurowa’s activities in the Eurowa Newsletter.