Sustainably developing the agri-food sector in Mashreq countries is of paramount importance for food security, job creation, expanded export potential, and social stability and inclusion.Digital technologies could create a new momentum for economic development by accelerating the structural transformation process and by supporting the transition...

English    “Youth, Actors for Change: Rethinking Mobility” This paper aims to contribute to a new discourse – around education, employability, and mobility, to enable the youth to become drivers for change in the Mediterranean region – appealed for in the “Commitments for a New Ambition in the Mediterranean” made in the framework of the...

Background In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic brought new challenges in countries already struggling to manage the additional social and economic pressure of hosting refugees and displaced. The lockdown measures put in place in many countries led to closure of businesses and halt of economic activities. Although social support measures were put in...

Rationale   The Metropolitan Workshops is an initiative by the Agency for Sustainable Mediterranean Cities and Territories (AViTeM), the Center for Mediterranean Integration (CMI) and the French Development Agency (AFD). It consists in a series of three immersive and interactive trainings targeting urban practitioners, urban planners,...

Interviewed by Paco Doblas for Aragón Radio, CMI Manager, Blanca Moreno-Dodson, weighs that the COVID-19 crisis is not one about vaccination rather about strengthen the health systems of the poorer countries and enabling them to manufacture their own medicines and vaccines in the future.

Background COVID-19 has had severe economic impacts on local economies and communities, particularly the most vulnerable. The pandemic has disrupted supply chains and led to reverse migration, stagnant rural non-farm economies, and devastating consequences for community/women groups, youth, and informal workers.  Extreme poverty is likely to...

Background Following HMLN members’ requests, the CMI and the GIZ Connective Cities Program have been working together to increase municipal capacities in finding alternative sources of funding. Among the activities, Connective cities led a Practitioners’ Workshop on “Local Economic Development and Job Creation in the Middle East and North Africa...

This article is part of the CMI/FEMISE joint “COVID-19 Med Policy Brief Series”, aimed at addressing the urgent issue of the COVID-19 socio-economic effects and impact on the EU-Mediterranean region.

Context   From December 7th to 11 2020, around twenty youth from the Mediterranean region have actively taken part to the Anna Lindh / CMI’s Young Mediterranean Voices (YMV) Communication Lab. With the aim to challenge extremist narratives in the digital world, they embarked in a five days’ workshop, during which they exchanged with leading...

Context   Local economic development (LED) is key to achieve sustainable development goals as well as a pathway to eradicate poverty and increase shared prosperity. Cities in MENA have registered relatively dynamic economic growth and investment rates during the first decade of the century, however, political instability and security threats have...