The "Horizon 2020 Mediterranean report - Toward shared environmental information systems" was released on the 13th of May at the UfM Ministerial Conference on Environment and Climate Change. The report is part of the mid-term review of the Horizon 2020 Initiative and has been coordinated by the European Environment Agency (EEA) and the United Nations Environment Programme/Mediterranean Action Plan (UNEP/MAP) with EC funding under the ENPI-SEIS project.
The "Horizon 2020 Mediterranean report - Toward shared environmental information systems" was released on the 13th of May at the UfM Ministerial Conference on Environment and Climate Change. The report is part of the mid-term review of the Horizon 2020 Initiative and has been coordinated by the European Environment Agency (EEA) and the United Nations Environment Programme/Mediterranean Action Plan (UNEP/MAP) with EC funding under the ENPI-SEIS project.
Despite the multiplicity of activities already being carried out by civil society and governments in the region to tackle the pollution problem, there is still scope for intensifying cooperation and information sharing, as, according to the report, there are still many data gaps, particularly for wastewater management. Countries should also invest in creating an emissions inventory to show annual emissions of pollutants from different industrial facilities. This is a necessary step towards regular progress in assessing the status of the Mediterranean. Applying all these measures could make policy more effective in reducing pollution in coming years.
The report covers nine ENPI South partner countries, namely Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine and Tunisia.
Based on the data and indicators reported by the Mediterranean partner countries and country analyses, the objective of the H2020 Mediterranean report is twofold: firstly, to inform on the pollution levels in the region, and, secondly, to take stock of progress made at regional and national levels in monitoring this progress.
The H2020 Mediterranean report is structured in three parts:
The first part provides a synthesis describing the process in setting-up a regular review mechanism and listing key recommendations.
The second part develops a regional analysis based on the key indicators agreed in the framework of the H2020 Review and Monitoring sub-group. This part highlights the major drivers of environmental changes in the Mediterranean region and their implications on the protection of the marine environment and puts emphasis on thematic assessments of the three H2020 priority areas (waste water and sanitation, municipal solid waste, and industrial emissions) developed on the basis of the data and information reported by the South Mediterranean Partners countries.
The third part gathers analyses written by the countries on the three H2020 priority areas (waste water and sanitation, municipal solid waste and industrial emissions), addresses specific country situations, existing national actions being taken and their associated problems and solutions.
See the full report at http://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/horizon-2020-mediterranean-report
