The first meeting of BLUEBIOMED’s Sounding Board, that took place online on Monday 15 February 2021, brought together representatives of key Mediterranean governance frameworks and initiatives. It sought to reflect on the way to scale up BLUE BIO MED’s and B-BLUE’s activities and outcomes, and pave the way towards a stronger MED blue economy innovation community.
BLUEBIOMED is one of the two Interreg MED Innovation Strategic Projects funded under Axis 4 (Governance) that promotes the transformation of the Mediterranean Blue Bioeconomy field towards sustainable development through innovation. It supports better governance of innovation policies bridging the transnational governance frameworks active in the Mediterranean area (i.e. UfM, UNEP-MAP, EUSAIR, WestMed, Bluemed Initiative, etc.) with policies at territorial – regional/national – level, assuming the Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as the common reference grid. The project works in a complementary way with the B-BLUE project focused on building the Blue Biotechnologies community in the Mediterranean.
The BLUEBIOMED Sounding Board is intended to be a body, brought together by BLUE BIO MED, made up of relevant Interreg MED projects as well as representatives of the main Mediterranean governance frameworks and initiatives.
The purpose of this first meeting was to formalise the setup of the board by acknowledging its composition, agree with its members on its role, responsibilities and scope of activities, as well as present next steps and upcoming activities. The main activities in which the Board will be involved were also discussed.
The following entities and representatives have been appointed as initial members of the Board:
Stefano Valentini, Alessandro Daraio, Emmanuel Maniscalco – BLUE BIO MED
Cristian Chiavetta – B-BLUE
Alessandra Sensi/Giuseppe Provenzano – Union for the Mediterranean
Fabio Fava – BLUEMED Initiative GSO Working Group
Daniele Bosio – Westmed Initiative
Elodie Nunes – CPMR Intermediterranean Commission
Céline Dubreuil – Plan Bleu
Irene Tzouramani – EUSAIR’s Pillar 1 (Blue Growth)
Tatiana Fernandez – PANORAMED WP10 Innovation (Catalonia Region)
Caterina Praticò – BLUE GROWTH Thematic Community
The Sounding board will be essential to ensure that the overall objective of the project is achieved. The very setup of this group was planned as part of the project’s activities. The three main objectives of the Sounding Board are the following ones:
- Steering the elaboration of the main projects’ deliverables that pave the way towards a reinforced MED Innovation Alliance for blue economy, in line with priorities and initiatives of the entities represented (members of the Board).
- Facilitating the uptake of relevant project’s outcomes activities by the entities represented.
- Ensuring the viability of the proposals to reinforce the innovation community and commitment of other key Euro-Mediterranean players.
Through this first meeting, the initial members of the Board could confirm their enthusiasm and availability to cooperate and enhance the contribution of strategic cooperation projects to Mediterranean governance. Many of them also stressed the importance of ensuring the involvement of Mediterranean Partner Countries.
