Blue economy for the Mediterranean

In the framework of the project entitled “A Blue Economy for a healthy Mediterranean” funded by MAVA, the final project conference took place in Marseille, France, on 30 - 31 May 2017. It was preceded by its Advisory Board meeting with the objective to review and validate the results achieved by the project and to give advice on the proposed agenda of the conference.

The conference was the second major event organised in the frame of this project. The first session was dedicated to the presentation of the project results and discussions, in particularly on the selected economic activities and the proposed indicators to measure their status and trends. PAP/RAC was responsible for the Component 3 on Promotion and mainstreaming of project results at the Mediterranean scale and internationally. The second part of the conference was focussed on specific sectors such as ship building, port activities, bio-prospecting, tourism, off-shore energy and fisheries and aquaculture. These most important sectors for the Mediterranean economy should take blue economy principles more into account if the Mediterranean region is to become a region where sustainable development will contribute to the wellbeing of its populations, as well as protection of resources and its rich biodiversity. All these are also the objectives and requirements of the ICZM Protocol and other MAP policy documents such as MSSD, SCP Action Plan and other international ones like SDGs of the UN. At the end of the conference, recommendations for the sectors were presented and discussed. The conference was concluded with a round table entitled “Moving towards a blue economy in the Mediterranean region”.