10 recommendations of IPEMED

How can we obtain achieving converging regional performances, socially and territorially more egalitarian? This is the question raised by the Institut de Prospective Économique du Monde Méditerranéen (IPEMED) in its publication « The Mediterranean Region in 2030 : the ways of a better future ».

In the frame of this publication IPEMED proposes some recommendations focused on the main stakes and factors of Euro Mediterranean convergence:

1. Investing in human capital by fostering mobility (allowing temporary migration for contract based services and projects co-financed by the UFM) and in qualification (creation of a common core and a Euro-Mediterranean network of vocational training and accreditation/recognition of skills and qualifications; supporting the Euro-Mediterranean University (EMUNI); strengthening ErasmusMed...).

2. Accelerating the transfer of skills, competences and technology (1) by facilitating the emergence of Euro-Mediterranean research and “competitiveness poles” (clusters) on carrier or rich in employment sectors (information and communication technologies for services, the agricultural techniques and energy efficiency, etc.); (2) by tightening localization on a regional basis – from this point of view, the implementation of a system of regional preferences that go beyond free trade and based on criteria concerning social, sanitary and environmental quality will contribute to accelerate transfers of capital and know-how.

3. Creating a common institutional space, supplementing transfers, an advanced status benefitting from “pre-accession” funds to the internal market (meaning the progressive implementation of the four liberties of circulation of goods, capital, services and persons), and accelerate the accession process of candidate countries to the EU.

4. Engage a Mediterranean certification process focusing initially on agriculture and services, with the implementation of a Mediterranean label guaranteeing health (establishment of a health agency) and environmental standards in agricultural products, a level of competence and quality of services for service providers.

5. Projects should be selected by the Union for the Mediterranean (co-financing) on their potential for job creation, and/or energy moderation.

6. Creating a Mediterranean environmental fund to finance, on the one hand, the strengthening of the capacity of adaptation to the climate change of southern and eastern Mediterranean countries and the Adriatic countries and, on the other hand, renewable energy transport’s infrastructure and alternative public transport projects, clean development projects reducing greenhouse gas emissions, rationalizing water demand and energy efficiency projects, especially for residential commercial buildings. Establish a EuroMed Fund for Solar Energy.

7. Set up a Mediterranean bank of investment, based on the same principles of the EIB, and created to encourage financing of the SME, key actors in the creation of wealth and employment.

8. Intensify transport networks in the South of the Mediterranean in order to facilitate the fluidity of South-South trades, with a particular attention on the multimodal transport allowing a better optimization of the logistics cost.

9. Elaborate a common food safety policy (mutualized devices of insurance of the agricultural risks; creation of security stocks and elaboration of mechanisms of emergency intervention) and of rural development (material and immaterial infrastructures of the sectors; manager and technological trainings).

10. Create a permanent Euro-Mediterranean center in order to assess convergence and divergence process of Mediterranean area, efficiency of policy implementation favorable to Mediterranean integration and to raise awareness among public opinion.