ENFORCE Annual General Assembly in Crete

From the 8th to the 10th of October 2025, the ENFORCE General Assembly brought together partners from across Europe at the University of Crete’s Natural History Museum in Heraklion, Crete. Over three inspiring days, participants exchanged ideas, reflected on progress, and planned future actions to advance environmental compliance through citizen engagement and technological innovation.

The Assembly featured a mix of workshops, plenary sessions, and stakeholder events, fostering collaboration and co-creation across ENFORCE case studies. Highlights included:

• Stakeholder Engagement & User Uptake Workshop: Led by Francesco Casaril (EARSC), partners identified the primary end-users of ENFORCE services, including public authorities, NGOs, private sectors, and civil society actors, ensuring project outcomes are effectively tailored to those who will benefit most.

• Defining the Environmental Compliance Approach: Anna Berti Suman (A Sud Ecologia e Cooperazione APS) shared results from a survey and interviews with over 170 respondents, offering insights into the efficiency and legitimacy of citizen science data in supporting environmental compliance. Georgia Tseva (AMARANTHUS, University of Thessaly) outlined how these findings will inform upcoming policy recommendations, citizen guides, and the ECCI roadmap.

• Ethics & Regulation Session: Georgia Tseva (AMRN, UTH) and Lisa Pourcher (G.A.C. Group, France) led discussions on GDPR, the Data Act, the Data Governance Act, and the AI Act, emphasizing transparency and compliance in citizen science data collection.

• Crete Case Study Progress: Presentations by Dr. Michalis Probonas, Christos Georgiadis, Katerina Vavadaki, and Manos Christofakakis showcased legal frameworks, reporting tools such as the Themis App, and practical enforcement cases.

• International Case Study Updates: All case studies shared insights from their regions, encouraging cross-case study learning and best practice exchange.

The Assembly also highlighted ENFORCE Plaza, the project’s browser-based platform integrating citizen and authority data with Earth Observation insights to support monitoring of forests, coastal zones, air, and water quality. Participants explored how the tool will facilitate alerts, data analysis, and replication in diverse environments.

In closing, Project Coordinator Svetlana Klessova reflected on the Assembly’s achievements:
“It is essential that all case studies coordinate to build together the services of the future ENFORCE Plaza. Having built a strong and steadfast community, our goal now is to engage with a broader audience and networks, joining communities of practice to share and promote ENFORCE innovations.”