First face-to-face meeting of the COASTRUST project: promoting shared stewardship for Mediterranean Coasts

SUBMON’s team is back from the first in-person event of the COASTRUST project, hosted by partner FAMP in Seville on the 15th and 16th of October. It has been great to finally put faces to all partners with whom we have been working since the spring. We had the opportunity to share ideas and experiences and discuss the next steps.

The COASTRUST project, funded by the Interreg Euro-MED Program, aims to promote shared stewardship along the Mediterranean coasts. It focuses on the use of environmental stewardship as an innovative coastal and marine conservation strategy in the Mediterranean Basin. It will develop a practical, step-by-step methodology in order to transfer the knowledge and lessons learnt during the project to other areas and interested organizations.

SUBMON is the leader of Work Package 1 “Preparing the ground”. This WP will draft the common COASTRUST methodology, which will pave the way for partners to implement their marine and coastal stewardship initiatives in their respective pilot sites. SUBMON will also train partners in relation to this methodology, as well as support and accompany them in their “stewardship journeys” during the project duration.

Presentation of WP 1 during the meeting in Seville.

With the COASTRUST methodology already drafted over the past months, the entire first day of the event in Seville was devoted to a Capacity Building session for partners led by SUBMON, with the help of external collaborator and consultant Jordi Pietx. During the session, the COASTRUST marine stewardship methodology was presented and discussed, explaining the different steps of such a stewardship initiative, the difference with land stewardship, how to define and prioritize the stakeholders, the importance of defining a clear objective, and many other related aspects. Following the session, several participatory activities allowed partners to share ideas, explain actions already taken, and discuss potential solutions while drawing inspiration from one another.

The second steering committee meeting took place on the second day of this in-person event. During the meeting, the consortium evaluated the project progress thus far, agreed on deadlines for upcoming deliverables and discussed how to effectively meet them, as well as addressed other administrative matters.

The work has just begun and will continue until the summer of 2026. Keep up to date by visiting the COASTRUST website and following its social media accounts on Facebook and Instagram.