On behalf of the Government, the Swedish Institute for the Marine Environment (Havsmiljöinstitutet) is a national academic node for interdisciplinary analysis and synthesis assisting marine environmental governance.
The institute supports both Swedish government, agencies and other interested actors in their effort to improve the marine environment by providing up-to date status-descriptions and analyses of knowledge on the seas around Sweden.
Since the founding in 2008, the Government has commissioned five universities with strong marine environmental research to cooperate within the Institute: University of Gothenburg, Linnaeus University, Stockholm University, Umeå University and Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. Each collaborating university contributes a certain number of personnel to the Institute.
The University of Gothenburg has the task of coordinating the running activities of the Institute and to accommodate a secretariat for the Institute and there provide a joint analysis and synthesis function.