Hall Level 4 Block N

Started on April 1st 2022, the Mara-Mediterra Research and Innovation Project is aimed at promoting the uptake of Nature-based Solutions to address the land and water degradation challenges in 5 hotspots around the Mediterranean. The project’s portfolio of solutions consists of 9 well-proven agro-ecological as well as 4 eco-engineering solutions. The Info-Session creates the opportunity to share the outcomes and results achieved during the first twelve months of project implementation. Speakers include Mara-Mediterra’s Project Coordinator, Dr. Vasileios Takavakoglou from the Soil and Water Research Institute (SWRI) in Greece, and Anna Spiteri (IRMCo) who is taking charge of guiding the project’s Living Labs. The event will also mark the launch of the UNIMED project which targets the development of a Survivability-of-Droughts Index in the context of the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystem (WEFE) Nexus. Speakers include the project’s principal scientific investigators in Turkey and Malta: Dr. Cem Polat Cetinkaya, from the Dokuz Eylul University, Industrial Application and Research Center (DEU DESUM), and Dirk De Ketelaere (IRMCo). Aside from delving more deeply into how the overall Survivability-of-Droughts Index will be derived from four underlying indices: perception, vulnerability, adaptability and recoverability, initial results based on the analysis of historical evidence of droughts will also be presented. Furthermore, the session will showcase the synergies that will be explored between both projects as well as other with other EU funded projects in which MCAST is currently participating and which will be presented by Dr. Sarah Camilleri and Dr. Francesca Busuttil.