Mediterranean Blue Economy Stakeholder Platform

The Mediterranean Blue Economy Stakeholder Platform was established by the European Union, the European Investment Bank and the International Maritime Organisation to provide a centralised web platform for marine and maritime information and to improve synergies across different initiatives and projects to facilitate coordination and cooperation in the Mediterranean region.

The original mandate to develop the framework for the creation of the Mediterranean Blue Economy Stakeholder Platform was provided in the context of the, ’The Integrated Maritime Policy for the Mediterranean’ (IMP-MED) project (2011-2013), funded by the EC EuropeAid Cooperation Office (AIDCO), in cooperation with DG MARE, which sought to provide opportunities to nine southern neighbourhood States in the Mediterranean (Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria and Tunisia) to engage in, and obtain assistance for, developing integrated approaches to marine and maritime affairs.

On November 2017, the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Ministerial Declaration on Blue Economy tasked the UfM Secretariat with further developing the MedBESP to strengthen coordination and cooperation in the area of maritime affairs in order to improve maritime governance for the Blue Economy in the entire Mediterranean Sea. The UfM is an intergovernmental organisation aimed at bringing together the 28 EU MS and the 15 southern and eastern Mediterranean countries, to enhance regional cooperation and dialogue on a wide range of topics (including blue economy) in the Euro-Mediterranean region.

Funded by the EU, the MedBESP is as a one-stop shop/online web portal allowing for the consolidation and sharing of general, technical, and sectoral information related to marine and maritime affairs in the Mediterranean. It compiles the most relevant maritime and marine projects, programmes, initiatives and knowledge resources across the Mediterranean and beyond.

One of its main objectives is to bring together the Mediterranean Blue Economy Community and ensure that registered users can submit information regarding their projects and initiatives in order to improve, coordinate, disseminate and widen the impact of their activities, and to extend their network as well as to open opportunities for new partnerships. Among other things, the platform facilitates contact between existing education networks, allows for exchange of information, including pedagogic tools, and serves as an interface for mobility programmes.