The UfM Trade and Investment Forum 2022 is the Forum’s fourth edition in four successive years, attesting to the emphasis that the UfM places on trade facilitation and investment promotion as pre-requisites of economic development and integration in the region. The Forum comes at a time when economic, political and humanitarian global disruptions are posing serious challenges that call for an orchestrated regional response that is innovative, sustainable and inclusive. Istanbul, 4 November 2022. Regional trade integration and investment promotion have always been priority areas of action for the Secretariat of the Union for the Mediterranean and are at the… read more
The 12th Ministerial Meeting of UfM Trade Ministers is due to be convened in the second half of 2023. 20 July 2022. The Member States of the Union for the Mediterranean convened today by videoconference for the third meeting of the UfM Regional Platform on Trade and Investment. They followed up on the planned work encompassing the three main pillars of Sustainable Trade, Sustainable Investment and Regional Integration, along the lines of the Joint Declaration by UfM Trade Ministers of November 2020. The meeting of the platform was chaired by the UfM Co-Presidency, the European Commission (DG TRADE) and Jordan… read more
The four awarded projects benefitted 18K people in 7 countries of the Euro-Mediterranean region, namely, Greece, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Morocco, and Tunisia Barcelona, 14 July 2022. As part of its regional response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the UfM launched a Grant Scheme for Employment Promotion in 2020 aiming at improving the employment situation particularly those from the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries. To showcase the work done and the lessons learned by the awarded projects, the Closing Ceremony of the UfM Grant Scheme for Employment Promotion was organized at the Union for the Mediterranean headquarters in Barcelona on the 14th of… read more
UfM Member States met today at the level of Senior Officials to discuss the activities and projects of the Union for the Mediterranean for the second semester 2022. They exchanged on the state-of-play of the preparations for the upcoming Ministerial Meetings on Research and Innovation (27 June 2022), on Transport (3 October 2022), and on Strengthening the Role of Women in Society (26 October 2022). They further granted the UfM label to the project ‘Euro-Mediterranean Guarantee Network (EMGN)’, which aims at facilitating access to finance, in particular for MSMEs, by in four areas: training, research and development, advocacy and communication… read more
14 June 2022, Online- The UfM Regional Platform on Industrial Cooperation convened on 14 June 2022, bringing together, along with the EU and Jordanian UfM Co-presidencies as well as the UfM Secretariat, representatives of Embassies, Small Business Act “SBA” coordinators and Senior Officials in charge of industrial cooperation from the UfM Member States. On this occasion, the most recent EU policies (EU Standardisation Strategy, EU Strategy for Sustainable and Circular Textiles and Team Europe Initiative on Jobs through Trade and Investment) were presented and discussed. Within the framework of the implementation of its new Work Programme for the period 2021-2024, the discussion focused… read more
Union for Mediterranean (UfM) Ministers in charge of employment and labour have agreed joint actions for a better integration of social and labour markets in the Euro-Mediterranean region. Governments will focus on a stronger participation of young people and women in their societies and economies. They also stressed the need to continue measuring the impact of labour market policies, and they agreed to launch a “Community of Practices on Youth Employment” to exchange best practices. The EU launched the regional Team Europe Initiative “Jobs through Trade and Investment in the Southern Neighbourhood”. On this occasion, Germany and Spain inaugurated a UfM… read more
Marrakech, 17 May 2022. The Secretary General of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM), Nasser Kamel; and the Director a.i. of the European Training Foundation (ETF), Xavier Matheu , have signed today a Declaration of Intent during the UfM Ministerial Policy Conference held within the framework of the fifth UfM Ministerial on Employment and Labour hosted by Marrakech, Morocco, on 17-18 May 2022. Under this Declaration, the UfM and ETF express their wish to share knowledge, expertise, and networks in order to follow up on the regional dialogue on Employment and Labour; contribute to the UfM Community of Practice on… read more
With a budget of €11 million, the UfM Hub for Jobs, Trade and Investment will contribute to employment promotion, the integration of Southern Mediterranean countries into regional value chains in goods and services, as well as to trade facilitation and sustainable investments in the region. Every third young person in the Southern Mediterranean is unemployed, while only every fifth woman in MENA countries participates in the labour market. Marrakech, 18 May 2022. On occasion of the 5th UfM Ministerial on Employment and Labour in Marrakech, the UfM Secretariat signed today a Joint Declaration of Intent with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Development… read more
The UfM Regional Platform on Trade and Investment convened its second meeting in 2021 by videoconference. 16 December 2021. The 42 Member States of the Union for the Mediterranean convened today by videoconference for the second meeting of the UfM Regional Platform on Trade and Investment. They followed up on the planned work agreed upon at the previous meeting in July 2021, encompassing three main pillars of Sustainable Trade, Sustainable Investment and Regional Integration, along the lines of the Joint Declaration by UfM Trade Ministers of November 2020. The meeting of the platform was chaired by the UfM Co-Presidency, the… read more
30 November and 1st December 2021. In collaboration with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), a UfM Practical Educational Workshop on “e-governance” was implemented by the Estonian ICT Cluster for the benefit of Mauritania in a hybrid format on 30th November and 1st December 2021. The third in a series of UfM e-governance Workshops organized throughout 2021 as a follow-up to the outcomes of the UfM Conference on “Digital Transformation and Digital Skills for the Future” held in Tallinn (Estonian Capital), on 30 September 2019, this tangible initiative aimed to provide an opportunity for best practices sharing on digitalization as well… read more
