Member states of Union for the Mediterranean agreed to advance solutions to meet water-related socioeconomic challenges, promoting climate resilience, while assisting women and youth towards job creation during the Joint Water-Employment-Migration (WEM) and Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems (WEFE) Task Forces Meeting of the UfM Water Agenda. 23 July 2020. The UfM Task Forces on Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems (WEFE) Nexus and Water-Employment-Migration (WEM) held a joint online meeting on 23 July 2020, which constituted the 4th meeting of the WEFE Task Force, and the 5th meeting of the WEM Task force. The purpose of combining the two TFs’ meetings was to jointly identify priorities of the… read more
15-17 July 2020. Women have not benefitted equality from industrial and technological development and have been profoundly tested by the Covid-19 health crisis, where women-led businesses have been specially hit. Half of the women-led enterprises in the Euro-Mediterranean region have had to suspend all activity. To focus on these challenges, the UfM partnered with UNIDO for the conference Women in Industry and Innovation – Building women‘s resilience to global challenges and emerging crises which took place online on 15-17 July 2020, gathering over 1600 users. The conference addressed how to improve resilience along value chains, realising emerging opportunities through ICTs… read more
The Senior Officials of the Member States of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) held a virtual meeting to exchange on the upcoming activities of the organization, especially within the current context, and in the framework of the 25th anniversary of the Barcelona Process. Barcelona, 22 June 2020. Due to the extraordinary circumstances caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the work priorities of the Union for the Mediterranean have rapidly adapted to help the region tackle the current situation. To take stock of the ongoing actions, the Member States of the UfM met virtually at the level of Senior Officials from the Ministries of Foreign… read more
15 July 2020. The coronavirus has challenged the core of what makes cities vibrant and successful: busy streets full of people. Will these cities ever come back to be the same? The webinar on Euro-Mediterranean cities in the post-pandemic era, organised by the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) in cooperation with the UNESCO World Heritage Centre reflected on sustainable urban development in the Mediterranean region after COVID-19, climate change, cultural heritage, and on the approach of the 2011 UNESCO Recommendation on the Historic Urban Landscape. The event was opened by the UfM Secretary-General, Nasser Kamel, chaired by the Deputy Director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, Dr Jyoti Hosagrahar, and structured around a conversation with Prof. Richard Sennett, Senior Fellow at the Centre on Capitalism and Society at… read more
PRIMA and UfM together call for greater attention to innovation and sustainability for rebuilding the region 16 July 2020. New Challenges, emerging trends and need of transformations: PRIMA and Union for the Mediterranean have promoted an online debate, discussing the first results of the survey on the agrifood sector, as well as concrete solutions and initiatives to address the challenges that are affecting the Mediterranean area. At the presence of UfM Secretary General and PRIMA Co-Chairs, the focus of the conversation has been from the very beginning on how to promote a rebound for the region after the pandemic has exacerbated the already existing problems from an economic, social and environmental point of view. To debate these challenges and the potential solutions ahead is even more relevant… read more
The 2020 UfM Mediterranean Climate Week discussed, among other topics, the progress of international public and private climate finance flows and how to optimise their mobilisation. Under the current scenarios, Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries per capita energy demand is estimated to increase by about 60% by 2040. These countries have attracted 9% of the international public climate finance commitments each year. Considering these countries are representing 4.1% of the global population, it shows the region attracts a high flow of investment. 14 July 2020. The limit of a 1.5ºC increase in the average temperature, not to be surpassed as… read more
The below expert article is provided by the European School of Intermodal Transport. The Barcelona-based school is a specialized training and knowledge transfer centre, which, over the past ten years, has acquired outstanding experience in staff training and capacity building activities related to efficient and sustainable transport solutions. The school is also the promoter of the UfM-labelled project “TransLogMED”, which aims to establish an efficient, interoperable and sustainable transport infrastructure network in the Euro-Mediterranean region. By Lidia Slawinska In recent times a vast number of technological transformations has encompassed the maritime sphere. A recent study (2020) commissioned by the European Commission’s… read more
Meet Raneem Al Jaouni, Jordanian student who just graduated in accounting at Princess Sumaya University for Technology in Amman. Her final year studies included a course called ‘Business Skills’, a university module of the wider Maharat MED programme, part of the UfM Med4Jobs initiative to help increase the employability of youth and women. 13 July 2020. Jordanian student Raneem Al Jaouni has always preferred working with numbers. Growing up in Saudi Arabia, she was drawn to numerical subjects, and this interest led to her to study for a degree in accounting at Princess Sumaya University for Technology in Amman, Jordan. Professionally, she is drawn… read more
Part of a wider UfM supported Plastic Busters Initiative spanning across the whole Mediterranean basin, Plastic Busters MPAs is an Interreg Med project aiming at maintaining biodiversity and preserving natural ecosystems in pelagic and coastal marine protected areas. Marine litter research expeditions have been carried out in the Pelagos Sanctuary (Italy), the Tuscan Archipelago National Park (Italy), the National Marine Park of Zakynthos (Greece) and the Cabrera Archipelago Maritime-Terrestrial National Park (Spain). 13 July 2020. Everyday life in the Mediterranean has been disrupted and changed over the last few months but the work that Plastic Busters MPAs carried out first at sea and then in the lab can… read more
The Diplomatic Academy in Vienna gave the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) the opportunity to share its vision of how the region must look in the future as the UfM Secretary General, Nasser Kamel, participated in discussions that explored what a post-pandemic world might look like. Vienna, 1 July 2020. The conference ‘From Victory Day to Corona Disarray: 75 years of Europe’s Collective Security and Human Rights System’ was co-organised by the International Institute for Middle East and Balkan Studies (IFIMES) and the EU media platform Modern Diplomacy to underline how the post-COVID 19 world is a near yet unchartered future… read more