The lack of knowledge of the relationship between measures taken within the drainage area and the likely resulting effects in the coastal and marine environments is a serious constraint. Political decisions on improved access to public sector information will be needed. Improved administrative procedures to facilitate access to and use of public sector data are also called for. There is also a need for technical and other measures to that effect. The information problem also concerns the scientific community internally, and the educational sector.
Scientific databases tend to remain closed and only accessible for the science project partners.
Thus, increased exchange of experience and knowledge, and a strategic information approach made possible with current Internet technology, would grately benefit the scientific community as such and, subsequently, the supply of information for effective decision-making. The scientists and decision-makers of tomorrow are found in the educational sector of today. Most schools in the Baltic Sea Region tend to focus upon the marine environment, including the problem of eutrophication, as a key case in environmental education. The opportunity to find relevant, comprehensible and reliable information in an interactive process on the Internet would provide young people with insights into the complexity of this environmental problem and the process of making decisions about cost-effective measures to counteract it.