A busy agenda in Tunisia

Several meetings involving PAP/RAC contribution were held in parallel on 3-5 October 2018 in Bizerte, Tunisia: the PAP/RAC Director was invited to present the ICZM Protocol at the Tunisian-French Conference on the Degradation of Coastal Ecosystems facing Climate Change, held at the Andalucia hotel on 3-4 October 2018. The Conference was attended by 80-odd participants from various Tunisian and French authorities, institutions and organisations including the non-governmental ones. That was also an occasion to have a separate meeting with the new Director General of APAL and agree on the common approach in implementing several initiatives of concern for PAP/RAC, i.e. the preparation of the National ICZM Strategy that should also support the ratification of the ICZM Protocol as well as the implementation of the pilot project in Gar El Melh area and the synergy to be ensured with the MAVA GEMWET project for the lagoon of Gar El Melh, in which PAP/RAC is a partner. That is also why a meeting of the MAVA project steering committee was organised on the same dates, at the Nour hotel in Bizerte. The project partners supported very much the proposed synergy that has started already during the joint field visit organised for the participants of both meetings. Finally, a separate meeting between APAL and the MAVA partners was held on 5 October 2018 in the APAL premises in Tunis to detail the terms of cooperation for the integration of all the mentioned coastal initiatives.