Restoring Coastal Wetlands in Europe – Implementation Roadmap to Guide National Action is a practical guidance document that presents the key findings and tools developed by the RESTORE4Cs project within a structured framework. It is designed to support national authorities and stakeholders in developing or strengthening strategies for coastal wetland restoration.
Europe’s coastal wetlands are vital ecosystems that play a crucial role in climate change mitigation and adaptation, biodiversity conservation, and the delivery of multiple ecosystem services. As highly productive and valuable environments, they function as natural carbon sinks and biodiversity hotspots. Consequently, they are central to several EU environmental and climate policy processes. These include, for example, the development of National Restoration Plans under the EU Nature Restoration Regulation, national commitments under the Ramsar Convention, and reporting obligations on wetland emissions and removals under the EU LULUCF Regulation.
The RESTORE4Cs Implementation Roadmap helps countries meet these obligations by guiding the design and planning of national coastal wetland restoration efforts. It builds on the latest scientific knowledge and integrates RESTORE4Cs tools and methodologies into a coherent decision-support framework.
The roadmap follows a step-by-step decision-making process, leading users from baseline assessment through to the planning and implementation of restoration actions on the ground.
To demonstrate its practical application, the approach was tested in two pilot countries, Portugal and Romania, highlighting how the roadmap and its tools can be adapted to different national contexts.
The RESTORE4Cs Implementation Roadmap to Guide National Action is available here:
The pilot national roadmaps for Portugal and Romania can be accessed here:
