Deliverable 1.8 - Recent progress and ways forward for Arctic observing capacities

Executive Summary This report presents the progress and insights from the observational activities in the EU Horizon 2020 Arctic PASSION project and offers recommendations for advancing a long-term, integrated observing system that better supports societal needs, scientific understanding, and informed decision-making in a time of rapid environmental change. The observation-related tasks of the project spanned the interconnected domains of Land/Land ice, Ocean/Sea ice, and Atmosphere. These efforts brought together diverse partners and perspectives to assess current practices, identify gaps, and propose practical steps toward a more coordinated, inclusive, and sustainable Arctic observing system that delivers data of the necessary relevance, quality, and accessibility. In doing so, the project also contributed to closing some of the identified gaps, through targeted activities, strengthened collaborations, and shared learning. A central message from our work is that long-term, internationally coordinated funding is essential— not only to maintain existing monitoring efforts, but to develop Arctic observing systems that are responsive to societal needs and capable of supporting operational services and long-term planning. We also highlight the need to improve information flow across the full data lifecycle—from planning and observing to data processing, analysis, sharing, and synthesis. Strengthening these connections will help ensure that Arctic observations are accessible, relevant, and actionable for a wide range of users. While many valuable observations are already being made, they still remain fragmented, short-term, or difficult to access and integrate. To address these challenges, we recommend: - Sustaining and expanding long-term observations across disciplines and regions to ensure continuity in tracking and understanding the rapid ongoing changes in the Arctic climate, environment and ecosystems. - Fostering collaboration and shared commitments among nations, communities, and organizations to reduce fragmentation, optimize resources, ensure timely data sharing and increase impact. - Continuing to harmonise data collection and processing, and strengthen open, user-friendly data platforms that meet FAIR and CARE principles. This will enhance data accessibility and reusability, improve complementarity across observing system components, facilitate data use for validation, and ensure that Arctic data is used and shared in accordance with the rights and interests of Indigenous Peoples and other data rights holders. Further detail and context behind these recommendations, along with a number of more specific suggestions for action, are presented in the full report.