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Thursday 24 Oct.:
RAC/SPA co-chaired (Souha EL ASMI) the Workshop on ‘Governance for developing MPA networks’ and made a presentation on
the ‘Creation of a new marine protected area in the Kuriat Islands (Tunisia)’ (presented by Souha EL ASMI).
Friday 25 Oct.:
RAC/SPA participated to the following workshops and knowledge café:
• The twinned workshops on ‘Sharing and improving practitioners’ skills’ and ‘Learning and developing regional training:
lessons learnt’ where a presentation on ‘The List of Specially Protected Areas of Mediterranean Importance (SPAMI List):
Status and perspectives of development’ was made (presented by Souha EL ASMI).
• The Workshop entitled ‘Towards ecologically representative and well connected regional networks’ where a presentation
on the ‘Identification and creation of new Marine Protected Areas in the Mediterranean’ (MedMPAnet Project) was made
(presented by Atef LIMAM).
• The knowledge café on ‘Ecoregional Analysis’ where a talk on the ‘Use of MAPAMED to conduct the Mediterranean regional
sea analysis of the status of MPAs: Difficulties encountered, suggestions for improvement, commonalities with the MAIA/
OSPAR database’ was made by RAC/SPA & MedPAN (Atef OUERGHI from RAC/SPA).
• The Workshop entitled ‘Following the movement: Regional networks and migratory species‘ where another Presentation on
‘Highly mobile threatened marine vertebrates need for large pelagic MPAs to keep a good status of conservation’ was made
(presented by Daniel CEBRIAN).
• The Workshop entitled ‘Climate change and regional strategies’ where the presentation ‘Guide for a climate change regional
monitoring programme and adaptation alternatives on Mediterranean MPAs’was made (presented by Alain Jeudy De Grissac
from IUCN-Med).
RAC/SPA also displayed three posters, on MPA creation activities, entitled ‘Towards a new Moroccan Marine Protected Area in the
Mediterranean: The Cap des Trois Fourches’ , ‘The MedMPAnet Pilot Project in Croatia’, and ‘Mobile threatened marine vertebrates need
large pelagic MPAs to keep a good status of conservation’
After the congress, and on the 26th October, a ministerial conference was convened, gathering 19 ministers of nations representing
world’s oceans. This Ministerial Conference, held in the presence of international institutions and NGOs, was structured around three
roundtables, on the following subjects: the benefits and urgency of conserving the oceans, promoting the regional scale as the
appropriate framework for effective action, and international initiatives needed to protect the high seas.
At the end, the Ministerial Conference let to a common declaration. Its signatories reaffirmed their determination to reach
the target of establishing by 2020 a network of comprehensive and coherent Marine Protected Areas effectively managed
and covering at least 10% of the oceans (Aichi 11), and notably the need to reach and implementing an agreement geared
at the conservation of the high seas. They also affirmed their desire to develop sustainable financing mechanisms that meet
the needs for the effective management of Marine Protected Areas and welcomed the launch by the governments of Monaco,
France and Tunisia of such an initiative for the Mediterranean sea.
© Lobna Ben Nakhla
© Lobna Ben Nakhla
© Atef Ouerghi
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