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HELLENIC REPUBLIC
MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS
ADRIATIC AND IONIAN INITIATIVE
CHAIRMANSHIP OF THE HELLENIC REPUBLIC
JUNE 2016-MAY 2017
Round Table on Blue Growth and Maritime Cooperation
of the Adriatic-Ionian Initiative (AII)
Heraklion, November 16, 2016
AGREED Minutes
The Round Table on Blue Growth and Maritime Cooperation under the Hellenic
Chairmanship was held on November 16th 2016 in Heraklion, hosted by the Region of Crete.
The meeting was chaired by Ms. Sofia Loukmidou, EUSAIR Coordinator for Pillar 1 (Blue
Growth) from the Hellenic Ministry for Rural Development and Food.
1. Welcome Address
After the welcome remarks by Mrs. Christina-Eirini Mavromati who represented the AII
Hellenic Chairmanship in Office and focused on how the present Round Table can support
and further promote the EU Strategy of the Adriatic and Ionian macroregion by offering
added value to the whole Region, Mr. George Alexakis, Regional Counselor of Crete in charge
of European Affairs took the floor underlining the importance of the Region as a key factor
for the success of periphery meetings such as the present Round Table. He stressed the vital
role of the periphery and island approach (insularity) in the context of EUSAIR.
The last welcome address was given by the Chairwoman Ms. Sofia Loukmidou who
underlined the importance of the involvement of the Regions to the Strategy and explained
the role of the round tables of the Adriatic-Ionian Initiative, which is to contribute to the
work of the EUSAIR Pillars by providing opinions or recommendations on specific topics and
actions. The Chairwoman introduced the theme of the round table “Blue Growth and
Maritime cooperation” and stressed out that “Blue Growth” is a long term strategy which
seeks to foster growth and job creation by investing in the marine and maritime sectors, the
so-called “Blue economy”. She welcomed the invited speakers by underlining the important
role of the scientists and the other stakeholders in exchanging information, experience,
know-how and best practices.
2. Adoption of the Agenda
The Chairwoman presented the Agenda which was adopted by consensus.
3. Topic 1: Scientific cooperation in fisheries and fish stocks
The Chairwoman introduced the first point of the agenda by underlining that "scientific
cooperation on fisheries and fish stocks" constitutes one of the priorities of EUSAIR Pillar 1
and that fisheries and aquaculture are important sectors for Blue Growth in the Adriatic-
Ionian region. In particular the social, cultural and economic contribution of fisheries is
crucial at local and regional level, especially for islands and remote regions. The Chairwoman
outlined briefly the two sectors and emphasized that in the Adriatic Ionian region, the fishing
activities are mainly small scale (80% of vessels are below 15m), many stocks are shared and
overexploited, while monitoring, control and surveillance is still weak in many countries. She
also referred to the Common Fisheries Policy (EU Member States have to comply with), to
the multiannual fisheries management plans and the value of data collection. The
Chairwoman recalled that cooperation on scientific issues and fisheries management is
already in place within the multilateral framework of GFCM and FAO regional projects
(ADRIAMED and EASTMED) and expressed the belief that building on this experience, further
scientific cooperation between the countries could be promoted in order to link scientific
research to the needs of fisheries. She also recalled the example of MEDAC (the
Mediterranean Advisory Council) which was created based on the Regulation for the
Common Fisheries Policy, in order to have a bottom-up approach in fisheries management.
The Chairwoman opened the discussion by giving the floor to the invited speakers.
Dr. George Tserpes took the floor by informing the audience about monitoring and
management of shared fisheries resources in the Adriatic-Ionian region. This mostly refers
to the stocks of species inhabiting international waters such as those of hake and pink
shrimps. These are stocks of high commercial value, which are poorly monitored, and where
harmonized management is essential to ensure, both, their sustainability and the
conservation of the environment.
Furthermore, Dr. Tserpes underlined the necessity of creating a network for monitoring the
distribution of alien species in the Adriatic-Ionian region. This question concerns tropical
invasive species entering into the Mediterranean through the Suez canal (Lessepsian
migrants). The expansion of alien species, which is facilitated by the climate change,
threatens the biodiversity of the Mediterranean and the sustainability of several types of
fishing activities, in particular small scale fisheries.
At that point, Dr. Fabio Grati from the National Research Council (CNR) of
the Italian Institute of Marine Sciences (ISMAR) intervened presenting the following projects:
1) ECOSEA Project: Protection, improvement and integrated management of the marine
environment and of the cross-border natural resources.
Objectives: a) sustainable development of fisheries; b) conservation and management of
natural resources in the Adriatic Sea through cross-border regional cooperation; c)
establishment of measures for the recovery of fisheries resources in the Adriatic Sea; d)
conservation of marine resources by bottom up approach, with the participation of
fishermen in the decision making process; e) increase of the awareness of fishery operators
on the threats concerning the Adriatic Sea,
2) ECOAST Project: New methodologies for an ecosystem based approach for spatial and
temporal management of fisheries and aquaculture in coastal areas.
Objectives: provide overall information for future development of fisheries in coastal
European areas by implementing and integrating already existing models (e.g. GRID,
DISPLACE, InVEST). Project goals will be addressed in seven case studies with common and
specific characteristics (e.g. coastal and artisanal fisheries).
A new project idea called "Papafish in the Adriatic Sea" was also presented by Dr. Grati. The
project is based on the development of a joint promotion strategy aiming to foster the
consumption of local fish in schools of the Adriatic Ionian macroregion in order to (a)
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increase awareness for sustainable and seasonal consumption, the respect of the
environment and the sense of cultural identity and (b) to foster innovation of the fish
processing sector.
Moreover, the project will directly involve, along the whole chain, the administration, the
schools and the fishery operators, in a concrete implementation of this particular innovative
model, which is based on education and promotion of the Adriatic Ionian fisheries and
aquaculture products. Concluding, Dr. Grati invited all AII partners to submit this project to
their countries.
Afterwards, the Albanian delegate Mr. Rigers Bakiu took the floor and presented his
proposals on how to promote research, innovation and business opportunities in the blue
economy sectors as well as on how to improve sea basin governance. Following a discussion
on the preparation of a project proposal similar to the Adriamed, he proposed to include to
the scope of the project the Ionian Sea regions. Mr. Bakius also proposed, as a priority
action, the issue of traceability of fisheries and aquaculture products by using molecular
methods. Furthermore, he supported the idea of improving collaboration between research
institutes especially in fish pathology, in the frame of a common platform or cluster, which
was proposed by other speakers, too.
Mr. Dimitrios Lemonakis who represented the Piraeus Chamber of Commerce & Industry
(PCCI), brought up the idea of linking scientific research and biotechnology with
archaeological research while Mr. Papandroulakis from the Hellenic Centre for Marine
Research mentioned an ongoing project carried out by five countries (Albania, Greece,
FYROM, Bulgaria and Cyprus) on a joint cooperation on research antiquities.
Consequently, Dr. Grigorios Krey from the Dimitra Research Institute for Fisheries took the
floor and informed the audience on the peculiarities of the Adriatic and Ionian Sea. He
underlined the importance of establishing a closer cooperation between the states of the
region in order to develop a more effective fisheries policy. Regarding fisheries, Dr. Krey also
supported the view that monitoring of fisheries activities, both in territorial and
international waters, is in the interest of all countries of the Adriatic Ionian macroregion, as
well as the identification of overexploited fisheries resources and the interactions of
fisheries with marine life in general (marine mammals, reptiles, birds). In addition, he
expressed the view that data collection can also be used for the traceability of fisheries
products in the macroregion. In order to address the above issues, the idea came up to
establish “clusters” involving research centers and governmental or local authorities as well
as other stakeholders.
4. Topic 2: Development of common standards and practices in the field of aquaculture, in
compliance with the EU acquis (i.e common licensing procedures, common applicable rules
for aquaculture products quality)
The Chairwoman introduced the second point of the agenda, by underlining that
aquaculture is a key sector in the blue economy of countries like Italy, Croatia and Greece.
She emphasized that aquaculture is one of the most promising activities in the region with a
significant potential for increasing capacity, and thereby reducing dependency on imports, as
well as for decreasing the pressure on wild stocks, provided this is done in a sustainable
manner. The Chairwoman also recalled that at EU level, MS have developed an Action Plan,
on country level, to increase aquaculture capacity. To open the floor for discussion, she
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asked the speakers to refer to already existing networks or working groups, in the Adriatic
Ionian macroregion, for standardizing licencing procedures, planning of space, developing of
site management tools, for environmental monitoring or the improvement of quality
schemes.
The discussion commenced with the intervention of Prof. Michail Pavlidis from University of
Crete (Department of Biology) who presented a strategic roadmap for aquaculture in the
Adriatic-Ionian sea basin. In this context, Prof. Pavlidis proposed to develop a joint roadmap
that will identify and coordinate relevant new business and investment opportunities.
Furthermore, he supported the creation of a transnational partnership of business network
organisations, public entities acting as knowledge providers, consultants and regional
authorities who will gather the scientific and industrial competence needed to boost blue
growth.
From the discussion that followed, Prof. Pavlidis identified as important priorities the
following issues: (a) multi-stakeholder offshore operations (platform or cluster to be
decided), (b) fish health, welfare and product quality and (c) knowledge management:
communication activities, education & transfer of know-how.
Afterwards, Mr. Papandroulakis took the floor and underlined the significant opportunity of
Greece, due to its geographical location, to develop appropriate strategies in collaboration
with other states in the Region. He stated that aquaculture represents an important activity
of the blue economy, especially for Greece. According to Mr. Papandroulakis, Greece has
developed a strategic plan for the development of the aquaculture sector up to 2030 as
described in the Position Paper presented in 2015, that has been adopted by the private
sector (Federation and Associations of producers), the administration (Ministry of Rural
Development and Food, Ministry of Education, Research and Religion-General Secretariat of
Research and Technology) and academia (Research Institutes and Universities). He explained
that for the governance of the strategic plan, a technological platform has been established
that will be inaugurated in December 2016. He also outlined that in the frame of EUSAIR,
activities can be planned to promote the Blue Growth Strategy in the macro-region. In
particular, for aquaculture there are 3 main axes around which common activities can be
developed: (a) “administration”, (b) “technology” and (c) “marketing”.
 Administration: includes legal framework, licensing procedures and monitoring of the
activity. Data is available from previous projects together with monitoring tools that
are under development (e.g. TAPAS project)
 Technology: covers all the methodological and technical issues related to farming.
This approach is species specific and until now locally defined. Additionally, the issue
of ichthyopathology and treatment is of high priority and exchange of information is
vital.
 Marketing: refers to quality of the final product, promotion of the industry etc.
It was pointed out that there is already a significant amount of “data” which is scattered and
requires a coherent analysis towards common strategies. Moreover, Mr. Papandroulakis
expressed the view that offshore activities is a topic with significant importance in the
context of Blue Growth. Going offshore however has a high cost and only multiuse
approaches are feasible. At EU level, some projects have already addressed the issue
(TROPOS, MERMAID, H2OCEAN etc.), however there are still gaps in the required knowledge
in particular for the Mediterranean. Therefore, future work has to be focused on (a)
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legislation required for offshore activities and (b) development of the appropriate
technologies for the Adriatic-Ionian macro-region.
At that point, Dr. Krey proposed to exploit the possibility of using “local”, instead of
”imported” brood stock in aquaculture and to mark out qualitative traits of the production
owing to particular environmental characteristics of the Adriatic-Ionian sub-regions. This
could be used to promote and increase the value of local products through PDO, PGO and/or
BIO labels. This activity concerns mainly traditional aquaculture methods in lagoons, rivers,
etc. On the other hand, potential conflict of interest and/or competition between intensive
aquaculture enterprises operating in the Adriatic-Ionian region may provide an obstacle to
the formation of “cluster(s)” addressing common problems and establishing common
practices.
5. Topic 3: Identification of networking and cooperation mechanisms for promoting and
supporting the marine equipment and shipbuilding industry serving maritime transport to
find innovative solutions towards safer, more efficient and cleaner ships
The Chairwoman introduced the third topic by underlining that the Adriatic and Ionian
region has not developped its full potential in clustering and for that reason cooperation and
networking mechanisms are main priorities for EUSAIR Pillar 1. She also informed the
participants that TSG1 identified, within its priority actions, the establishment of macroregional research & development & innovation platforms on green sea mobility.
Prof. Dimitrios Lyridis from the School of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering (NTUA)
took the floor presenting two projects:
The first one concerned the Sea Traffic Management system in the frame of the Action
MONA LISA 2.0 which started based on the results and experiences from the MONALISA
Action (2010-EU-21109-S) and was co-financed by TEN-T under the Motorways of the Sea
Priority. MONALISA 2.0 focused on strengthening efficiency, safety and environmental
performance of maritime transport, at the same time as the administrative burden of the
maritime sector is reduced. Nine Member States (Sweden, Germany, Greece, Spain, United
Kingdom, Denmark, Malta, Finland, Italy) were involved in the study.
The suggestion arising from the first presentation is the validation of the Sea Traffic
Management System and its implementation, to allow full coordination between Transport
and all Maritime/Marine and Tourism Activities for better, cleaner, and safer exploitation
and sharing of the common maritime space.
The second project entitled ELEMED Action concerned ship and port electrification. The
Elemed Action has as an overall objective the introduction of on shore power supply to ports
across the South East Mediterranean. Its aim is the minimisation of emissions (including
noise) from vessels in ports for a more sustainable and efficient transportation system and
the eventual integration of the port electric grid with the smart city grid. Bringing together
expertise from a classification society, an academic institution, a research organisation, two
specialised engineering companies, a modern shipyard, and four ports from three Member
States along the East Mediterranean corridor, ELEMED studies, analyses, and assesses all
necessary technical requirements for the introduction of cold ironing to the Ports of Piraeus,
Kyllini, Limassol, and Koper. ELEMED will perform the necessary technical studies and will
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provide solutions specific to each of the ports, and will study the installation of energy
storage devices for electric power peak shaving.
Moreover, a modern regulatory framework to tackle barriers and encourage the wide use of
cold Ironing will be formulated. A real-life pilot installation will be built in the port of Killini
for the supply of electricity to a vessel calling at the port, based on a detailed Front End
Engineering Design, in accordance with the applicable IEC standards. Finally, ELEMED will
exploit funding and financing possibilities using innovative financial instruments available
from the European Union and the European Investment Bank, such as the Connecting
Europe Facility, the European Fund for Strategic Investments (Juncker Plan) and the Green
Shipping Scheme. This will eventually crowd in private investment and will allow the
introduction of such infrastructure to all major ports of the South East Mediterranean area.
The suggestion arising from the second presentation, is the exploitation of operational
requirements from maritime activities so as to better define characteristics of electrical
vessels that can be used to support marine activities in a cleaner and emission free manner.
However, another important outcome will be the development of innovative financing tools
for activities related to blue growth, stemming from the transport sector and exploiting
synergies and funds available to a large extent only there.
Consequently, Mr. Lemonakis took the floor presenting the concept notes of two distinct
inititiatives:
The first one is a project that has been submitted to the Adrion Programme and highly
relevant to EUSAIR. The AIMNet project discusses among others:
• Competitiveness of Maritime Industry & EUSAIR
• Blue Technology development & smart specialisation strategy
• Willingness to proceed towards more inclusive networks
• Mapping of clusters, identification of research centers and enterprises
• Creation of the quadruple helix Cluster
The main aim of the project is to strengthen the innovation and cooperation among SMEs
and between SMEs, big enterprises and research centers operating in the Adriatic-Ionian
Macroregion as qualified segments of the shipbuilding and marine sectors. The AIMNet
project is currently under review for qualitative evaluation.
The second project is entitled Piraeus Cluster of Marine Services and Ship-repairing. The
main key issues and concerns are summarized as follows:
• Encouragement of clustering & cooperation of enterprises, universities/research
institutes and public authorities
• Research on blue technologies & prioritisation of its adoption by SMEs
• Promotion of blue skills in order for the labor force to be able to handle innovative
procedures
• Reinforcement of networking and knowledge sharing as well as effective creation of
marine databanks, within an enhancement of international visibility
• Operation of a one-stop-shop for the support of SMEs
The main aim of the project is to establish a Cluster, to increase investments in the Region,
to set priorities for innovation and cooperation among SMEs and to increase
competitiveness. Special attention will be warranted to the collaboration of other marine
clusters of the macro-region, in order to share best practices and further expand
networking.
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The aforementioned project is in the phase of planning and development, however it has
important connotations for the reach of the Macro-regional cluster development initiatives.
Last, Mrs. Sofia Perogiannaki representing the Heraklion Port Authority took the floor
presenting two Projects Proposals.
The first proposal with the acronym ANDRIONPort aims to enhance the transnational
cooperation in order to tackle environmental vulnerability, and fragmentation with the
development of an environmental management system for the ports in the Adriatic-Ionian
area. This project proposal includes the establishment of a Decision Supporting System (DSS)
aiming to develop an Action Plan based on the assessment of uses and threats in each port
and to design common tools for the forecasting and monitoring of the marine environment.
The second project with the acronym ERMES aims to enhance capacity for integrated
transport and mobility services and multimodality in the Adriatic-Ionian area. ERMES project
intends to standardize the technical specification for the management of cruise passengers
and goods flows during the port operations.
In the context of finding innovative solutions towards safer, more efficient and cleaner ships
Mrs. Perogiannaki presented the participation of the Heraklion Port Authority in the
European project Poseidon Med II which aims to promote a wider adoption of LNG as
alternative fuel for shipping.
After that, the Chairwoman thanked all participants for their attendance as well as for their
significant contribution to the meeting concluding that she has gathered useful information
to convey to the next day's TSG1 meeting. Mrs Mavromati representing AII Hellenic
Chairmanship expressed also her appreciation to the participants for their interesting
presentations. Then, the Chairwoman closed the Round Table.
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