PANACeA

Plan Bleu is partner of PANACeA, a regional initiative of streamlining management efforts in Protected Areas for an enhanced Protection in the Mediterranean Sea.

This project, coordinated by the European Topic Centre for Spatial Information and Analysis at the University of Malaga, is one of six Horizontal Projects approved from the first call of the Interreg Med programming period 2014-2020.

The objective of PANACeA is to streamline networking and management efforts in Mediterranean Protected Areas (PAs) as a mechanism to enhance natural conservation and protection in the region. A Community on Biodiversity Protection was built in order to reach this objective, and is composed of the 11 following projects of the Interreg MED Programme: ACT4LITTER, AMAre, CONFISH, ECOSUSTAIN, FishMPABlue2, MEDSEALITTER, MPA-ADAPT, PHAROS4MPAs, PlasticBustersMPAs, POSBEMED, WETNET.

The project aims at assisting relevant Mediterranean stakeholders, ensuring synergies among this community, and increasing the visibility and impacts of projects’ results towards common identified strategical targets.

PANACeA acts as a Science-Policy-Interface (SPI) to foster the exchange of experiences and knowledge sharing and thus, influences a behavioural and policy change in the Mediterranean region.

A Community articulated around three cross-cutting issues:

• Addressing biodiversity protection challenges in Protected Areas, with a focus on climate change and marine litter.
• Sustainable use of resources, with a focus on fisheries.
• Integrated ecosystem monitoring.

Next events

TheFinal Conference of PANACeA will be held in Malaga, Spain, from 14th to 16th of October 2019. It will be the opportunity for the official signatory ceremony of the MED Biodiversity Protection community’s Declaration, the “Ecosystem based approach for biodiversity protection and management” launched at the EU parliament in December 2018 in Brussels.

Past events

The MED Biodiversity Protection Community organized a capitalisation event on the 6-7 May 2019 in Rome (Italy). The 11 projects of the community gathered to work on the strategic topics concerning mediterranean biodiversity protection and protected areas.

The Mid-term workshop and public hearing of the Mediterranean Biodiversity Protection Community featured by the PANACeA project took place in Brussels,on 4th and 5th December 2018. The aim was to transfer the lessons learnt by the Community of Interreg Med Biodiversity Protection projects and protected areas to national and international policy makers.

In the framework of the Fish Forum 2018 (Forum on Fisheries Science in the Mediterranean and Black Sea), the Biodiversity Protection Community organized a side-event, on 10th December 2018, called “Promoting co-management as innovative tool for the sustainable use of coastal and marine natural resources “.

The Biodiversity Protection Community organized in collaboration with Région Sud a knowledge sharing workshop on “ Transferring ecosystem-based management tools: increasing regional capacities” that was held in Marseille, on 23 October 2018 from 14.30 to 17.30.

In the framework of the 22nd edition of Ecomondo that was held in Rimini, Italy, on 6-9 November 2018, the Biodiversity Protection Community organized, with 5 other Interreg MED thematic communities (Green Growth, Blue Growth, Renewable Energy, Urban transports and Sustainable Tourism), a session on “Empowering territories for a sustainable Mediterranean“. More information …

A side-event was organized by the Biodiversity Protection Community in the framework of the 14th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD COP 14), that was held in Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt, from 17-29 November 2018. More information …

The seminar,that was held in Podgorica, Montenegro, on 16-17 May 2018, aimed to highlight and transfer practical methodologies and tools developed by current EU and Mediterranean research, management and policy projects to stimulate a Euro-Mediterranean technical and political debate on latest strategies and tools for ecosystem-based management and biodiversity conservation.

On April 18-19th, 2018, a meeting took place in Rome, gathering the eight community’s of the INTERREG MED Programme 2014-2020. Built on the concept of Fablab: “Fabrication Laboratory”, the MADE in MED event presented the first results of the 90 projects of the Programme through a conference and an exhibition.

These two days were an opportunity to convey the idea and values of co-working, knowledge sharing and innovation but also to look towards the future of cooperation in the Mediterranean.

PANACeA’s second event was organised in Barcelona, on October 23-25th 2017, under the topic: “Bridging the Science-Practice-Policy Interface in Biodiversity Protection”. The dialogue was articulated around 3 cross-cutting issues that have been specifically identified as relevant to the Community: addressing biodiversity protection challenges in protected areas; sustainably manage resource, especially in the fishery sector; and ensure an integrated ecosystem monitoring. During the capitalisation conference, held on October 23rd and 24th , the members of the community had the opportunity to exchange with several experts (decision-makers, scientists, managers) involved in biodiversity protection. The second part of the event was a community building meeting which purpose was to elaborate action plans for the three working groups implemented in the framework of PANACeA project.

The project’s kick-off meeting took place in Marseille, on March 15-16th 2017, with the participation of the 9 projects of the Community on Biodiversity Protection. This meeting helped to reinforce the links among the projects and PANACeA partners, and to draw an action plan for the Community.

The Community’s projects

• ACT4LITTER : Joint measures to preserve natural ecosystems from marine litter in the Mediterranean Protected Areas.
• AMAre : Actions for Marine Protected Areas, integrated management and maritime spatial planning.
• CONFISH : Connectivity and knowledge transfer among Mediterranean fishery stakeholders and scientists resolves connectivity of fishery populations.
• ECOSUSTAIN : Ecological sustainable Governance of Mediterranean Protected Areas.
• FishMPABlue2 : Fishing governance in Marine Protected Areas: potentialities for Blue Economy.
• MEDSEALITTER : Developing Mediterranean-specific protocols to protect biodiversity from litter impact at basin and local Marine Protected Areas’ scales.
• MPA-ADAPT : Guiding Mediterranean MPAs through the climate change era: Building resilience and adaptation.
• PHAROS4MPAs: Blue Economy and Marine Conservation – safeguarding Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas in order to achieve Good Environmental Status.
• PLASTICBUSTERS MPAs: Preserving biodiversity from plastics in Mediterranean Marine Protected Areas.
• POSBEMED : Sustainable management of the systems Posidonia-beaches in the Mediterranean region.
• WETNET : Coordinated management and networking of Mediterranean wetlands.