This year the Mediterranean Coast Day Week was celebrated in Split (Croatia) from 24 to 26 September. It was organized by Priority Acton Programme/Regional Activity Centre in collaboration with the UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) ‘Coast‘ programme within the SHAPE project (co-funded by the EU´s IPA Adriatic Cross-border Cooperation Programme). During the celebrations, a technical meeting took place with PAP/RAC and nine National Focal Points (NFP), at which representatives of PEGASO and SHAPE informed participants about the progress made by these two projects. A joint meeting of the PEGASO, SHAPE, MAREMED (MAritime REgions cooperation for the MEDiterranean) and PERSEUS (EU Seventh Framework Programme) projects was also organized to share results relating to the implementation of the ICZM Protocol.

The joint meeting was an opportunity to present the PEGASO project and above all to promote the PEGASO platform as a hub for all ICZM practitioners, researchers and stakeholders. Participants highlighted that there is still considerable room for improvement regarding cooperation among projects to avoid duplication and to create synergies. Furthermore, most of the participants agreed that a strong message needed to be sent to the European Commission´s Directorates-General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries and for the Environment with a view to improving integration of marine spatial planning (MSP) and ICZM.

A declaration by the joint projects meeting on achieving stronger cooperation and synergies among the projects was approved by the representatives of SHAPE, PEGASO, MAREMED and PERSEUS, as well as GEF (Global Environment Facility) MedPartnership, FaceCOAST Med-Cluster, and ResMAR (Network for Environmental Protection in Maritime Space).

Back-to-back with this coastal week, a SHAPE workshop on national ICZM strategies for the Adriatic countries was held. The main objectives of the workshop were to present the guidelines for the preparation of the national ICZM strategies required by the ICZM Protocol for the Mediterranean and to draw up proposals for the development of an outline for national ICZM strategies tailored to the Adriatic countries, as well to provide suggestions for the further development of the outline.