 Yes, but I think it can work, it can work. Hi Lydia, welcome from Greece. Hello. Hello. So the streaming is starting. So please connect your phone. Hello from JK, my name is Tamer. This is the first day of the week. So welcome, everybody, to the launch event of the SDSM of the Terrarium Report 2020. I'm glad to move away from this launch event. And I thank you very much all the speakers, all the SDSM partners, all those who are attending the forum. I run through, briefly run through the agenda of this event. And after that, I will call all the speakers to intervene in the agenda, asking them to turn on their microphone and their camera and to respect the time in order to respect all the times of our agenda that we have planned. So we start with the institutional remarks from Angelo Riccaboni, Chair of SDSM Mediterranean and Nasser Kamel, Secretary General of the Union for Mediterranean. Then we have an intervention of Paolo Blicenti, Commissioner General for Italy's participation in Expo 2020 Dubai. Dubai 2020 is the main global event after the pandemic planned for the 2021 with a particular attention to sustainability and, among the others, to the Mediterranean region. After that, at 3.30, we have the presentation of the report by Riccardo Pulzelli. At 3.45, we have a discussion on the report with Mediterranean Hubs and MED institution. We have the intervention of by Al-Mazzaladi from UFM, Tamer Attaq Abarut from SDSM Turkey, Fibi Konduri from SDSM Greece, Julien Littelier from UNEP MAP, and Dr. Marcolli, Co-Chair of SDSM Cyprus. At the end, at 4.15, we have the final remarks by Professor Jeffrey Sacks, President of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network. So welcome again and thanks to all the speakers, the partners, and those who are attending these events online. The floor is for Professor Angelo Riccaboni, Chair of SDSM. I please all the others to turn off their cameras and their computer, please. Thank you very much. Thank you, Simone. Good morning and good afternoon to distinguished speakers and the participants to this event organized for the launch of the 2020 report of Sustainable Development in the Mediterranean, prepared by SDSM Mediterranean. As many of you probably know, SDSM MED is the regional network of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, promoted by the United Nations, and led by Jeffrey Sacks from Columbia University, to valorize the role of research, innovation, and education to implement Agenda 2030. And we all know, especially in these times, how important competence and knowledge are for our present and our future. It is of great pleasure for me to launch the second edition of the MED report with the presence of the Secretary-General of the Union for the Mediterranean, his Excellency, Nasser Kamer. The Union for the Mediterranean is a pivotal institution for the promotion of cooperation and dialogue in the Mediterranean area, and a very active player in several domains, such as research, innovation, water, environment, education, employability, energy, generation. In the last few years, I have been working closely with Nasser and UFM in the field of sustainable food systems, and I take this opportunity to thank him for his continuous support and his leadership. At this event, I also welcome the presence of Commissioner General for Italy's participation in Expo Dubai 2020, Paolo Glisenti, which confirms the importance of international events of cultural and science diplomacy as an opportunity for promoting more sustainable, resilient, and prosperous Mediterranean societies. I would also like to acknowledge the contribution to the SDSM MED activities given by representatives of SDSM national centers, and in particular, Cyprus, France, Greece, Italy, Spain, and Turkey. And the presence here today with us of the UNEP MED representative who will enrich the debate about the report. I'm sure that we all share the view that collaboration is key to tackle the environmental, health, and social challenges in front of our countries in terms of climate change, well-being, excessive exploitation of natural resources, high unemployment, social and gender inequalities, incorrect dietary habits. And in these difficult times, more than ever, we realize that Agenda 2030 is the most effective framework within which to cooperate and build back better. We need to accelerate the implementation of Agenda 2030. And in order to accelerate such implementation, transformation is a key concept. We need radical changes. We need to transform our social, job, education, food, environmental energy systems. And precisely on this concept, on the concept of transformation, we have prepared our report. SDSM MED is very keen on promoting transformations, acting as a social policy interface in favor of institutions, decision makers, businesses, and civil society. And proposing in this report, not only analysis, which is very important. And we will hear from Ricardo Pucelli, which are the results of our analysis. But Ricardo also will mention policies and actions to achieve the SDGs. We need to be concrete. We need to propose actions. We need to promote actions. I conclude to say how honored I am to pursue such endeavor in collaboration with Professor Jeffrey Sachs, which has inspired the Agenda 2030 and will conclude our debate today. Thank you very much, Sachs, for your leadership and vision. Before giving the floor back, I would like to thank Ricardo Pucelli, Simone Cristi, Massimo Giotti, Guido Berlini, Stefano Toraldi, and Barbara DiPaolo, and all the staff of Santa Clara Lab for their contributions to the report. And now the floor back to Simone. Thank you. Thank you, Professor Riccaboni. Now the floor is for the Secretary General of Union for the Mediterranean, Nasser Camel. The floor is for you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for your very capable handling and management of our session today. Ladies and gentlemen, a good afternoon to all of you. And a world of thanks to my very dear friend and partner, Angelou Riccaboni, of course, Chair of the Mediterranean Sustainable Development Solution Network. But for me, it is the co-chair of RIMA, a very dear initiative and project that fits and represents and optimizes what we stand for at UFM. I'd like also to extend a word of thanks to Professor Geoffrey Sacks, President of the Sustainable Development Solution Network. The Union for the Mediterranean has recognized the groundbreaking nature of the United Nations sustainable development roles since their approach. It has been proactively working hard to support the implementation in the Mediterranean region at political, dialogue, and project levels. We see the SDGs as a guarantee of the coherence of regional positive action. Ladies and gentlemen, now we all understand this is a watershed year. The pandemic has accelerated or completely altered the course of different mechanics happening in our world and in our region. In the span of human, COVID-19 has pushed us into unprecedented crisis. The OECD estimates that each month of confinement there will be a loss of nearly 2% in annual GDP growth and that the economic impact alone is now expected to be worse than the 2000 economic recession. The pandemic has reconfirmed that the systems on which we depend are not only increasingly interdependent but also growingly vulnerable. This is a difficult challenge but also an opportunity. An opportunity for increasing resilience and future growth in our region, by implementing, of course, the SDGs. Yet, in order to verify the degree of the achievement of the SDGs so far, we need to come with solid data from reputable sources aggregated at regional level. So the analysis done by SDSN met in this report is really fundamental for supporting policymakers and institutions in shorting the path towards the 2030 and, I hope, beyond that. Aggregated data further helped us focus our action and to give a few examples. For instance, thanks to the medical report supported by UFM, we know that the rise of temperature in our Mediterranean basin is progressing 20% faster than the global average across our region. Therefore, the health and wealth threat multiplied by climate change is especially intense in our region. We also know, thanks to science, that the demand for water, food and energy is increasing due to population growth and economic development. It is estimated that by the year 2050 we need 50% of water, 60% of food and 80% more energy on a global level. Hence, we have to work on all of these sectors through an axis of economic, social framework and science-based. And this is where the Union for the Mediterranean and Prima comes in. Since 2017, we at UFM Secretariat have specifically referred to the UN SDG as indicators on our impact of our activity. We tend to call ourselves the regional dimension of the SDG. Indeed, the 17th SDG Partnerships for the Golds is a guiding star that is particularly congenial to our work at UFM. We seek to come together through organizing political expert dialogue, political expert dialogue platforms and developing strong network of light-man-minded partners. Research also and innovation are also key in our endeavors. Let's take the example of the ongoing initiative such as Prima headed by you, my dear Ricardo, which deals with many points raised by our SDGs such as water scarcity, a particularly difficult challenge in the region with only 2.5% or 3% are not mistaken of the world resources of fresh water, the environment and of course the climate emergency that we are facing today and more specifically facing more in our region. This year we will also celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Barcelona process which launched as an unprecedented framework of dialogue on the basis of equal footing between North and the South of our motherland. It is therefore an appropriate moment to reflect on the factors that help us forge ever stronger bonds among the two shores of the Mediterranean Sea to complete action. We are going to celebrate this anniversary on the 27th of November our 42 member state will meet in the UFM region and foreign to assess the state of our region and define our way forward. The report you are representing today is definitely going to help us visualize the challenges ahead and call us and everyone else and also call the region for joint common action in terms of achieving those goals. And I want to tell you not only tell you but I assure you that you can count on the UFM to support efforts directed at achieving the SDGs in the Mediterranean region and therefore global because as the convenient efforts goes a rising tide lifts all goals. Thank you very much for having me with you today. It's a great honor and the floor is yours. So thank you very much to UFM also for the availability you demonstrate during these last words and now I ask to Dr. Paolo Vicenti in the commission general for Italy's participation in Expo 2020 Dubai to take the floor. Thank you and good morning good afternoon to everybody. I'm very happy to be here with you at this important event to launch the 2020 MED report and I'm also happy to emphasize the importance of Expo 2020 next year because not only is going to be the first global event of the pandemic but it's going to mark the beginning of the last mile to the 2030 deadline of the agenda of the SDGs so it's going to be a very crucial turning point for multilateral cooperation international cooperation towards the achieving the achievement of the SDGs. And thanks to the support of Angelo Riccaboni in his team Italy is ready to present to the world audience and gather in Dubai next year the best innovative and sustainable practices in the Mediterranean region for the efficient use of water resources in agriculture for the highest quality, safety and security of food products for the new productive opportunities in arid and deserted soils provided by precision agriculture. At Expo Dubai Italy and Prima will champion and showcase the best of the 27 calls which have been selected by Prima this year in its 2018-2028 the channel program. This project is important to say is all projects developed with the participation and the scientific contribution of Mediterranean universities and research centers. At the first world exposition to be held in the Middle East, North Africa Southeast Asia region I think it will be an extraordinary opportunity to demonstrate how much innovation and sustainability in the part of the world more seriously suffering the effects of climate changes, loss of water resources urban expansion and traffic growth can be today generated in a collaborative, multidisciplinary multi-sectorial and multi-countries approach. I think in the sense that Dubai will give us a sign of hope in our troubled times to look at sustainability and innovation as part of a doable achievable worldwide agenda. And I thank you again for having me here to listen to your report and to your remarks which will inspire us and inspire our participation in the expo Dubai. The floor is yours, Simone. So thank you to Paolo Glisanti, we joined the Global Hope for the future and now it's the turn of Riccardo Pulcelli and Riccardo let us know which is the excavation in the Mediterranean, so the floor is yours. Okay, thank you. I guess you can see the video and my presentation and also you can hear my voice otherwise please let me know. I will briefly present contents of the sustainable development in the Mediterranean report and this is the second edition of this report that I had the opportunity to write together with co-authors on behalf of the S&D S&M Mediterranean that is hosted by the Santa Clara Lab at the University of Siena. The report is based on results from the Sustainable Development Report 2020 the World Edition. We took most of the indicators and dashboards from this report but also we provided additional information regarding the dynamics within such complex and complicated environment. The Mediterranean region is a complex environment including 24 countries that of course share one common sea but at the same time they belong three different continents and also there are many differences in terms of economy, society, culture environment. Also you know that the Mediterranean region is the most sensible region in the world to climate change after the Arctic and this can also provide additional problems. Based on the observations made through the indicators we could anyhow highlight or identify four macro areas not based on political reasons but just on a sort of homogeneous behaviors that are Europe West, Europe East, Middle East and North Africa and that will help us to support our storytelling throughout the entire report. I will show you this picture this is the dashboard concerning the SDGs in the Mediterranean countries. First of all I will say that the general SDG index of the Mediterranean is 73.5 This value means that the Mediterranean region is at 73% in the way towards the SDGs and as you can see in the picture I will not go into details but if you look at the picture at the glance you will see that there are just a few green lights and most of the lights are yellow, orange and red this means that there is still much to do to achieve the SDGs in the Mediterranean and also if we check the trends in the SDG index you can see that there are a few green arrows that means positive trends and many stagnant or even decreasing trends. Based on the observation of the results on the analysis we could highlight a few hotspots concerning the Mediterranean region we can say that considering the average income per family almost 50 million people in the Mediterranean are at risk of poverty including 27 million Europeans women rights and opportunities for women emancipation must be improved if we consider rates of participation in the labor force well this is quite low but also it's even lower the participation of women in political activities down to 18% in the Middle East and North Africa and also women in leading positions I mean in a position of top managers in private companies and enterprises is less than 5% the job market is stagnant the unemployment rate in general in the Mediterranean is around 11% also the number of need is increasing there are many young people that are not in training and are not looking for a job this is quite alarming this is almost 20% of youths in the Mediterranean also food habits are going in a wrong direction we are in the place of the Mediterranean diet but the obesity affects 26% of the Mediterranean population up to 35% in some countries of the Middle East and sustainable agriculture is really an important goal if considering that most of the agricultural practices in the Mediterranean are based on intensive agriculture water management is also an issue especially considering the sensitivity to climate change some countries in North Africa and the Middle East are going towards a condition of water scarcity that is less than 500 cubic metres per capita and we should avoid this situation of course water quality is also a problem considering that less than 50% of water used in the Mediterranean is released into the environment without any treatment and air quality can be a problem considering that 70% of the Mediterranean population live in cities and is exposed to pollution of course in terms of sustainable energy the European trends are very good of course but we should improve these trends also in the other Mediterranean countries as well as investments in research and innovation fisheries is based on unsustainable practices aquaculture can be an opportunity to manage the fish stock in a sustainable way if well managed of course and environmental protection is as well quite important both in lands and marine areas well we structured the report on the six transformation frameworks suggested by Jeffrey Sachs in the previous report but also in a famous paper published on the scientific journal Nature the six transformations framework is just an operative framework the idea was to make it easier to implement concrete actions towards the achievement of the SDGs and what we did was to identify six centers of excellence in the Mediterranean with the high expertise in some specific topics in order to let them cooperate to achieve this transformation there is one center one Mediterranean hub per each transformation and the report was used to start this cooperation and that will keep going in the next future even more intense about these transformations the report is structured based on this framework and there is one chapter per each transformation and the transformation are described based on the resource of the indicators that are related to different goals of course but in particular we could highlight and visualize specific challenges per each transformation that we have to face in the next future so you will find per each transformation around 10 main challenges that we have to urgently manage in the next future and the transformations are education and gender inequality, health, well-being and demography, energy decarbonization and sustainable industry, I will show you for example in the transformation for sustainable food, land water and oceans for this transformation the SDSN Mediterranean is in charge I will just give you a short example in terms of food habits for example this is one of the challenges we highlighted the reference indicators are the prevalence of obesity and the consumption of food the diets that are used in the Mediterranean in terms of sustainable agriculture we deal with the food, the self-sufficiency of countries and the release of nutrients into the environment in terms of water management and water quality for example we consider the rate of renewability of water resources but also accessibility to water services and water treatment in terms of environmental protection we consider the enlargement and enforcement of protected area in the Mediterranean so this is an example of how we structured the report and the kind of information that you will find in the report the transformation five is about sustainable cities and communities, the transformation on digital revolution has much to do with all the other transformations of course the last part of the report is about the concrete actions that we wanted to suggest through a sort of roadmap including 150 let's say policies but we also can call them recommendations, these recommendations are classified into different categories for example governments and public authorities can operate to release new regulations and protocols as well as new practices of governance in this case for example we deal with sectoral planning let's think of the urban planning for decarbonization or programs for waste management and resource management for mobility sustainable mobility or biodiversity also governments are very important to promote incentive schemes to promote innovation towards sustainability but also in this case companies and private enterprises play an important role for example public private initiatives are desirable to improve innovation in this sense should I ask you to go toward the conclusion please of course it's the last slide then educational programs are very important not only address to young students but also in terms of knowledge transfer to enterprises and practitioners that have to change their mission towards sustainability as a leverage for market stakeholders engagement is important for the role can be played by the scientific community digital transformation is important as well as market that can be driven by the consumers and their choices international partnership is very very important of course and we are looking for not a gradual progress but transformation and the goal the final goal is set in the forward of the report to finally close the gap between rhetoric and action I'm very proud of this outstanding and thank you very much for your attention thanks a lot Ricardo the picture you showed us about digital is really complex but at the same time really interesting now I ask to our speakers of next panel discussion panel with Mad Hubs and my institution to turn on then their cameras so Alomaz Abadi from UFM Tamer Atabarout from SDSN Turkey Fibi Konduri from SDSN Greece Julian Natelli from UNEPMAP and Dr. Marcolli chair of SDSN Cyprus all of you can hear me yes okay Dr. Eratou Marcolli can you hear me? I can hear you I don't know if you can see me because I registered very late I don't know if I'm logged in properly but I can hear all of you I can see all of you I don't know if you are able to see me okay thank you very much for being here take the floor for the first intervention to Alomaz Abadi from UFM I thank you to stay within 5-6 minutes each of intervention I apologize now to jump into your speech when the time is finished thank you very much thank you very much Simone thank you very much for this very informative presentation of the report we are working in parallel with you as you know everybody from Lima from all SDSN Mediterranean in order to meet synergy with the Union for the Mediterranean Water strategy as everybody knows that the Union for the Mediterranean Water sector also had endorsed by the UFM member state since 2017 onward what we call it a living documentary which we call it the UFM Water policy framework of action in 2013 which is absolutely a policy recommendation for the region agreed and endorsed by the 42 member states of the Union for the Mediterranean that the way that our member states see that they will contribute to that sustainable development goals the great work of sustainable development goal came on time 2020 showed that we still need to work on building partnership, building synergy in order to overcome our challenges when it comes to the water sector because according to the work bank publication OECD and all other lead international organization and development agencies working into sustaining the economic and social life of the citizens in the Mediterranean or globally they are emphasizing on the fact that we have to tap over the way how we manage our water sector the six transformational mentioned here are very essential are in line with our policies recommendation that the 42 member states are doing either at national or local sub regional and regional and globally in order to advance better socio-economic reality for our citizens in the Mediterranean the issue in the UFM member states and recently from the EU UFM water business forum held in Cairo hybrid during the period of 18 to 22 of October 2020 we had also brought some thoughts that are in line with your recommendation that in order to fix the issues we need to look at the government aspect we have to look after the way how we regulate the water sector as well as other sector in order to bolster economic development and to invite different segment of civil society into the water governments as well as into the water management here when I talk about the civil society we have to always at the first of the list the woman and the role of the gender in the water management and in the water governments also the most important recommendation that I saw in this report which is how to fix us with the business opportunity how to make the water sector a very inviteable sector in order to bring the private actors here when it comes to the private actors I'm not talking about the big investment, the big infrastructure luckily our member states had brought those big investor into the water management when it comes to the desalination of the wastewater treatment plans but this based on contractual arrangement our observation from the union for the Mediterranean and police recommendation is to more concretize this process of engaging the private sector by putting a very good regulatory framework that regulates their roles and guarantee for double services and for the private actors. The second part that I'm working on under the leadership of His Excellency as he said I would like to quote him how to make the Mediterranean an inter-brunnery environment to make more opportunity for young people in order to contribute to the different sector and the water to achieve the SDGs number six and it's associated like 7 energy 14, 13 and 14 with the specific focus on the climate action SDG number 13 we have to work together in order to build partnership and enabling environment to bring young people to invest and to start their jobs out of these four important sector and to be frank the only comments that I am putting on this report which is I hope that NICS will consider a new transformation which is the issue related to policies and the NICSAS so we believe at the union for the Mediterranean and this is what the UFM water policy is building NICSAS between the four sector water, energy, food, ecosystem NICSAS those are linking together for up to six SDGs like 6, 7, 14, 15, 2 and 13 and I hope that we will consider this transformation on policies because it's very important to send it to the local level and to invite our member state in order to work on the whole government approach that will enable more coordinated approach at national level that will yield to more coordinated approach at regional level that will yield to a more comprehensive coordinated approach at global level with this I would like to send the floor back to Simon and thank you very much all for hearing us also thank you thank you Almotas for this interesting thought about NICSAS and the third is for the chair of SDSM Turkey the floor is yours sorry could you unmute okay perfect thank you now we can hear you first of all I would like to thank Angelo and his team for their invaluable efforts for the preparation of this report as we are SDSM Turkey we are very happy to contribute to this report as the lead of the transformation of sustainable cities and community and we are believing in the power of solidarity and we would like to work much more in collaboration for sustainability in our common home in Miltrain Basin. In the report a set of indicators has been selected as the most relevant to report on current state highlight the hotspots and track the progressive transformation aims to make cities economically productive socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable. As a guideline to accomplish the transformation the list of challenges for policies and strategies is also given in the report as Ricardo stated and we all know that the Miltrain Basin is one of the most fragile region in the world in terms of climate change and the environment. The evaluation reports of the IPCC foresee that the general temperature increase in the Miltrain Basin could reach 1 to 2 degrees Celsius. The drought will be felt in white regions and the number of extremely hot days and hot airways is going to increase and particularly in the central sections it will be much more serious impacts. So cities need to increase their resilience against the climate change and extreme weather events. The policies should be developed and implemented such as disaster risk reduction, climate change adaptation and human security. The possible effects of climate change at regional scale in Miltrain Basin will be able to amplify the existing scarcity and allocation problems also. In this aspect this will worsen the current conflicts among water users that are already observed as a result of intensive entrepreneurship activities in the Mediterranean. Turkey tried to establish policies to prevent the problems of food, water and energy security and influence of migrants in the last decade. However the number of climate induced crisis is increasing in Turkey. In the last 20 years the crisis increased 64 compared to the period of 1995 to 2000. So the increase in the frequency and intensity of natural disasters caused a serious threat to our cities in Turkey and they are hitting much more cities in Turkey in terms of economic, social and environmental impacts. The third corner when SDSN Turkey has initiated an intensive action about the transformation of sustainable cities and communication at the level of municipalities. So last year we organized a three-day long cities for climate workshop to raise the awareness on climate action and build capacity of municipalities staff on program sustainable energy and climate action plan. At the last day of the workshop the representatives of the 24 Turkish municipalities declared their intent to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2030 and with the cities for climate action declaration was announced to the public. The declaration highlights that for a fair, equitable and sustainable future local leaders must take concrete steps against the climate crisis. We need to work on detailed education programs and due to the COVID-19 pandemic it compelled us to change the format of education and now we are much more active and efficient in the online courses. So we just completed the sustainable cities and climate change online training and now there's another program is ongoing how to achieve STG's interpush municipalities so in the recent years also the Turkey has started to prioritize the waste management over the concerns of rising environmental damage with the municipalities responsible for waste collection upgrading their collection systems but also in order to promote their recycling activities and as STS and Turkey we support from the support the Turkey's zero waste policy and we are the part of the advisory board of this zero waste policy in Turkey. So thanks to the project tons of plastics and recyclables are recovered and they were not accessed to the STG. I just remember that in 1990s I was a part of a report it was just prepared by the World Heart Organization to just determine the land-based pollution of the Mediterranean and it was huge, it was huge so we have to control our waste and we have to recycle, reuse and waste minimization and elimination to get the target of zero waste policy. As STS and Turkey we are also actively working with the pilot municipalities for developing a specific index and preparing their volunteer local reviews and we believe in partnership and keeping the motto no one behind but also in collaboration with the government the unions of municipalities, some international organizations like the UNDP and all stakeholders so we have to hand-to-hand to have a better Mediterranean so we have to combat against these climate risks and also we have to achieve those STGs and we have to work together. Thank you. Thank you, Professor Tamara Batabarut and now I ask you, Professor Fibi Konduri from the chair of SDSN Greece to intervene. Fibi, thank you for your intervention. The floor is yours. Could you unmute? Yes, I've managed to figure out the Italian version of unmute. Simon, thank you very much for having me here. It is always a pleasure to participate in the launching of this very important report that SDSN Med is putting together. It's now a valuable reference point for our network but also for the whole of the Mediterranean region for the European community and globally. This is an important report not just because it allows us to have a measurement of progress with regards to the STGs in the Mediterranean region and it is important to be able to measure progress in detail because only by measuring we can identify the needs, the guts, the needed interventions in order to make progress. It is important, especially important because the report refers to a region that is particularly vulnerable with regards to climate change but also is vulnerable geopolitically. This report does not only document where we stand with regards to the transition to sustainability but it also documents explicitly the need for collaboration, partnership and solidarity between all the member states across the Mediterranean. It is an important report, especially now with COVID-19 because it gives us a documentation of where we have been before COVID and we know how we need to reboot and recover our economies after the pandemic. One of the major contributions of SDSN Greece is the report that we are putting together and our report will definitely embrace the report on STGs in the Mediterranean about the SDSN European report. Our report is focused on the European Green Deal and identifying pathways for the joint implementation of the European Green Deal, the STGs, the European semester process recommendations and not only identifying technological and investment pathways towards this joint implementation but also identifying the financial portfolios that will support this implementation and these portfolios will derive from the European Union enhanced multi-annual financial framework that incorporates the recovery and resilience fund for the EU next generation and of course the budget of the European Green Deal. It is important that you are presenting the Mediterranean aspect of this recovery because Europe has recently announced that Africa is one important priority. So the collaboration between Europe and Africa and across the Mediterranean basin is a focal point now in the European Commission. In addition to the European Green Deal report that UNSDSN Greece is putting together and this report is producing results of green and digital pathways for each and every of the 27 countries in the European Union. We will also incorporate an annex deriving from your report that integrates the Mediterranean aspect of the story and we are doing the same in the Lancet Commission for the COVID-19 I am co-chairing the task force on green recovery job space green recovery which identifies as our pathway to recovery that this pathway needs to be based on the sustainable and inclusive economies based on the SDGs and the Paris Climate Agreement. It identifies a public investment should be oriented towards sustainable industries and the digital economy and should spare complimentary private investments and of course a major goal of the recovery should be an unprecedented commitment to reskilling and upskilling of people including the skills to prepare workers for the digital economy. So what we are proposing for Europe and for the Mediterranean we are proposing for the whole work of course keeping in mind the specific of each different country and continent. With regards to your report we are supporting the industry decarbonization transformation one of the six transformations and of course you know the mission has lately announced increased ambition for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions on the 17th of September the president of the commission announced that the target is increasing from 40% to 55% to a target of 55% decrease in greenhouse gas emissions means just for Europe a revision of the national energy national energy and climate which will cost 350 billion per year. So it's a big challenge. The money at the moment are there finance by national debt the debt crisis is another issue is over Europe and over the world this time given that the pandemic is worldwide but this is something we need to handle in a spirit of solidarity I think and Europe and the Western I'm finishing and Europe and the Western world should show solidarity in addition to decarbonization circular economy climate change adaptation are important and I will close with this one remark I think that we are doing a lot and we are and what we are doing is important however I think one aspect is missing and it's the climate change impacts on cultural heritage the Mediterranean is important with regards to cultural heritage and we should I think mobilize the resources to this angle the European Green Deal includes nothing on cultural heritage there is one Greek initiative under the auspices of the UN General Secretary which aims to introduce a new IPCC report which will ideal only will cultural heritage and I urge all of us to include this aspect in what we do in our report in our initiatives and in our projects thank you very much thank you very much Phoebe a very good interesting point about the cultural heritage for the next edition in the meantime I would like to welcome Professor Jeffrey Satt we are in the middle of the discussion and then it's your turn but now I want to give the floor to Julien Etelier from UNEP map another really interesting and important part Julien the floor is yours and thank you for inviting us to this launch event and very interesting discussion indeed I am speaking on behalf of the UN Environment Programme Mediterranean Action Plan UNEP map this is a UN treaty signed four decades ago by the Mediterranean Coastal State and the European Union the goal is the protection of the marine and coastal environment as a contribution to the sustainable development of the entire Mediterranean region and it leads to Kunt University of Siena as an official UNEP map partner and a member of the Mediterranean Commission on sustainable development which is the multi-stakeholder advisory body gathering not only government representative but also stakeholders from various categories my comment on the report based on a robust methodology this report provides knowledge on SDG's trends in the Mediterranean and the importance between the current situation and SDG targets and the situation is dear indeed alarming when we look at the red and orange points in the dashboard as the report said the road to achieve the SDG's is still long by clustering SDG's around the six transformational areas the report showcases all progress or failure regarding a given SDG can affect another development area this is an integrated approach whereas SDG's are still often addressed from a sectoral perspective that can create silos and limit the interaction the visual representation of indicators is also a very good point and when it comes to COVID-19 I fully concur with the assumption that despite of temporary good effect on the environment recorded during the lockdown, the decreased attention to climate and environmental issues can be also expected we are delivering very similar messages in our strategic response to COVID-19 which is aligned with the four unit building blocks another added value is the speed order the speed order index to measure transpondery impact generated by one country and indeed good performance in western Europe can impact negatively countries with lower income compromising their performance and chances for development in the Mediterranean region, there are important socio-economic and demographic asymmetries conducive to migration but also to competition on resources. This inequalities between countries call for addressing common transbandary issues such as food security marital transport of shore activities and water resource management. At UNEPAP we are convinced that environmental diplomacy towards environmental peace shall contribute to human security and well-being in general when the report conclusion mentions the EU Green Deal it will be interesting to develop even more on solidarity with the south for building back better at the entire Mediterranean basin level. The sustainable construction and production should be at the core of building back better or building back greener towards a green resource in our region considering the COVID-19 crisis as a wake-up call. In the same then as a response to the speed over effect the report could pledge even more for international partnerships in particular in this time of multilateralism crisis versus national isolation with all my appreciation and congratulations please allow me to raise also a few suggestions. Only a few bullet points appear for recommendation under environmental protection at the end of the report and references to major international framework and publication are lacking. I am thinking to UNEPAP publication, IPBS or IPCC for instance the recommendation are mainly oriented on development issues focusing on construction and production on the socio-economic component of sustainable development rather than on the environment which is at the core of UNEPAP mandate and that represent a complementarity with our work. A number of those recommendations are echoing our mandate and work with our regional activities centre, the UNEPAP component those recommendations could take more into account what is existing in terms of regional cooperation in our region and I am thinking to institution to regulation and the goal instrument to action and implementation. For instance when it comes to common strategies for sustainability in the Mediterranean, SDSNMED could have built on the Mediterranean strategy for sustainable development which is a translation of the SDGs at the regional level adopted in 2016 by all the Mediterranean countries. I would have other comments but time is limited so to conclude, at the global level the annual SDSN report which falls under the category of academia literature complement or even precede the launch of the official UN SDG annual report. The same happened in the Mediterranean region. This year the SDSNMED report complements our report on the state of the environment and development the SOED recently released as a UNEP publication prepared by our plan blue regional activities centre. The preparation of this SOED was developed over two years with contribution from more than 120 authors and the SOED covered a wide scope of issues from demographic trends to human development to bio-ethnicity decline, pollution and climate change. We should also strengthen the complementarity between our Medical Alliance Sustainability Dashboard consisting of a list of sustainable development and SCP indicators and the SDSN SDG index and dashboards and in fact we face the same issue of sustainability at national level including in international databases so I fully support the point from Kibikon Duri calling for the importance of monitoring of indicators and those dashboards. Finally the 2020 SDSNMED report represents an excellent reference for the participatory and indicator based midterm evaluation of the MSSD and strategy for sustainable development for which we rely on your active contribution. So let's pursue our collaboration and work together for a better monitoring and implementation of the 2030 Agenda in the Medical Alliance. Thank you very much. So thank you Julien. We are happy to contribute to the MSSD midterm evaluation and now the floor is Dr. Erato Marculis co-chair of SDSN Cyprus and former minister of Foreign Affairs of Cyprus. So Dr. Marculis the floor is yours. Thank you very much Simo and thank you for this very important meeting. We are a very young member of the SDSN community. We launched the SDSN Cyprus last June. Because of the pandemic unfortunately we have not had the possibility of moving as fast as we wanted to move. But we are in a process now of building up more the membership. We have already more than 20 members. We have six universities which are our members right now. And we are collaborating with a lot of partners and of course in contact with the government which we have the full support of the government in this endeavor. The report for us is extremely important. This is the second report but this is the first time that we are able to contribute also to the report. We are very proud and honored that we have been assigned the very important transformation the digital transformation and I can vouch and commit our SDSN Cyprus that we will do everything possible to fulfill the commitments and help in this very important area. I wanted to start with the pandemic and its effects. I think this is not only for our region but also for the entire pandemic and I am very much afraid that the consequences especially the economic consequences all over the world are going to affect the implementation of the SDGs as it was planned. Every country, every region in order to gain this lost period and what will come during the next months I think 2021 is going to be very critical for all our countries and especially in Mediterranean it was said earlier it's a very vulnerable region I think it has been affected probably more than many other regions of the world it is heavily dependent on vulnerable sectors of the economy that have been affected by the pandemic so as a region we need to work very hard and the key as it was said by Dr. Riccabone is collaboration and this is an area that I want to center a little bit because we see all the indicators, we see all the efforts by different countries but I think what is missing is the area of how we can put our efforts together and how we can use the best examples for example if countries have achieved certain levels, higher indicators we have to emulate from these countries we have to share information how they have achieved this and for Cyprus which is a new SDSN we rely on the experience of our partners in the SDSN community to see how we can speed up our efforts to achieve that I'm not going to say much more because I think I agree with almost everyone that preceded me I am the last one on the list but I wanted to say a little bit about the digital transformation and how our SDSN Cyprus can contribute SDSN Cyprus and the Cyprus Institute on which on whose premises SDSN is hosted we already have in place a very important pilot model which is serving the eastern Mediterranean region that can be scaled up to cover the entire Mediterranean region at the heart of this is Cyklon the new high performance computing facility of the Cyprus Institute like its predecessor which was the CyTerra it is one of the most powerful civilian high performance computing facility infrastructure in the Mediterranean and it is not simply an in-house computing facility not even a national computing facility it is a collaborative facility which provides free access to computing time and storage space for academic partners throughout the eastern Mediterranean so we have already the infrastructure and we are very keen in working with all of you to see how we can put into action this very important transformation which covers of course every sector of the economy including agriculture, mining, finance, media, health education public administration and you name it so we are very anxious to start working on this with your help, with your collaboration and we look forward to future meeting like this I think they are very important, thank you very much so thank you to you and thank you all for your thoughts, your consideration and suggestions, we have take notes of all the ideas and all the recommendations for the next report the third edition of the SDSM Mediterranean report and we are looking forward to collaborating with all of you, now the floor is for professor Jeffrey Sachs, president of the Sustainable Development Solutions Network with final remarks, professor Sachs the floor is yours, thank you very much thank you very much and let me say a warm hello to all colleagues and friends and congratulations thanks to University of Siena the Santa Chiara Lab for the fantastic report and the great work and all of you for the efforts at organizing a unique initiative that I think is incredibly promising and incredibly exciting let me make just some very brief remarks first, thank you for this idea of the leadership of the different SDSM country networks on the six transformations I think the six transformations are an exciting and potentially a very important way to view the SDG challenge because what we're really saying in the six transformations is we need deep and long-term change, long-term meaning at the scale beyond the political cycle, change at the scale of 20, 30, 40 years and a lot of our work I think is setting that direction and emphasizing the fundamental changes that will need to be made for building the future that we want we see that very clearly in the case of energy for example and the work that Phoebe is leading on the energy transformation and the pathways to get to net zero by 2050 but I would say that every one of the six transformations in education and innovation in health and well-being in the industrial transformation in sustainable land use in sustainable cities and in the digital transformation should be viewed at this 10 to 30 year perspective to appreciate how deep is the change that we're really aiming for and therefore how different it is from a normal political business cycle a normal policy cycle it's not a short-term initiative it's not a one-time investment to address a problem or to patch up a problem it is aiming to entrain our business, political academic and civil society and to create a vision of where we want to be and then to create a process of how to get there and in this regard it's to my mind a different kind of policymaking and a different kind of politics and an exciting prospect and really help to bring it about because it is lengthening the time horizons deepening the objectives looking more holistically looking at technological transformations really a more imaginative and creative process than normal policymaking so that's the first point I want to emphasize and please let's think about ways to support each of these national networks in their championing of one of the transformations and let's be meeting a lot this coming year to make this real just as Arato told us about the digital initiatives in Cyprus which are very very exciting that's so essential the digital revolution that is about that and try to scope out this deep transformative longer term vision and how to get there second point that for me is thrilling and basic and very much in line with what Julian just said as well this is truly Mediterranean wide and that's exciting because these regions are really different to the European North Africa, Eastern Mediterranean regions face different challenges the indicators make this very clear but it is one integrated region for the Mediterranean to be healthy we need a healthful societies all around the Mediterranean and of course all of the countries share the vulnerabilities to the ecological changes to the pollution the direct damages taking place in the Mediterranean sea itself and also the benefits of interconnection when it comes to renewable energy systems for example we really want to interconnect North Africa with Europe as we've talked about for decades but now as energy transformation is truly underway we need to turn those long held ideas into practical realities so I would like to encourage and emphasize every way that we can bring more colleagues from North Africa and from the Middle Eastern Eastern Mediterranean countries Syria Jordan, Israel, Egypt Palestine into these active discussions with us because I think that this is really crucial and I don't think they're as deeply institutionalized as they should be budgets tend to stop at the European boundary more or less except in very notable programs like Angelo's Prima program which is designed specifically for the Mediterranean wide reach and we want more of that and we want each of the areas of the European Green Deal to include a Mediterranean component that doesn't only stop in southern Europe but includes the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa as well so I'm very excited about that and any ways in the coming year that we can deepen our consultations so that all of the countries that are in this report are also at the now virtual table will do it online no doubt but at the virtual table will be a big plus and I think help us to move ahead and I firmly believe that also even in conflict zone areas like Libya or in contested spaces like Israel and Palestine if we're thinking about practical issues of food production energy systems and so forth we can get to practical answers that move beyond political bottlenecks right now I know it's not so easy but I think that it's probably the most important way to do that which is to focus on common interests and therefore practical solutions the third point that I would emphasize is how crucial is the European Green Deal right now it is in my view the best we have in the world of a transformation agenda that really looks at transformation in depth, in scope in holism and in time dimension it's really well done as I like to say it's totally bureaucratic but in the Weberian rational bureaucratic mold in other words it's really thinking through systematic processes to make change in the best of the bureaucratic sense who has responsibility who needs to do what what are the timelines what are the processes but it's not a plan it's a process right now the European Green Deal is not a plan I want us to help fill in the plans at the country level at the regional level what really to do because what the European Green Deal is is a set of timelines milestones in a absolutely desirable holistic approach but it doesn't have underneath it the what to do in detail and Europe still too much then leaves the what to do at the country level rather than really regional investment strategies though that's getting better it's still not enough in my view we need regional energy system we need regional food production distribution use management system we definitely need regional systems for the ecology the region for the health of the Mediterranean sea and so forth so I think the European Green Deal is a huge plus and it is already having its global diplomatic effect definitely Europe brought the East Asian countries into the recent announcements of China net climate neutrality by 60 Japan under new Prime Minister Suga announcing very quickly upon his new Prime Minister ship climate neutrality by 2050 Korea the same so we really have a lot of partners and once we pry Trump's finger from his Oval Office desk and carry that man out of his office we're going to have a good president in the United States and there will be a US Green Deal in effect to join this so I think we're going to have a lot of opportunity diplomatically for the European Green Deal to be applied first in the European countries the 27 I hope we can find ways to extend this to North Africa and the Eastern Mediterranean because it's a framework not only European policy but a very well designed framework and then as part of global diplomacy and I'll just end at that point to say that 2021 is potentially shaping up as a breakthrough year I don't think that's just a cliche I think it's actually real this has been a very very tough year with COVID with Trump with just a extraordinarily difficult year 2021 should be much better our governments by then first should figure out how to contain this pandemic they've not quite done so unfortunately that's why the second wave is so terrible but the knowledge of what to do is much better there will be vaccines coming which will help probably in mass use by the second half of 2021 and partial use before then that will help there will be President Biden that will help a lot because the madness from the United States was the greatest distraction to global policymaking in the world in recent years it just stopped logical thinking in the G20 and in so many other processes that will improve dramatically and colleagues we have at least three major global events next year that we should be present at in a very active way the first is COP 15 of the Convention on Biological Diversity in Kunming China in May which should set ground rules for biodiversity conservation for years ahead the second is the World Food System Summit called by the UN Secretary General in the fall very important opportunity for us and if the SDSN Europe and SDSN Mediterranean works closely with FAO WFP the Rome based institutions I think we can and all of the initiatives that we have with Barilla and the food industry and Regeneration 2030 with Andrea we really can contribute to the World Food Summit in an important way and then of course we have COP 26 in Glasgow in November which needs to be the time in which every country has committed to decarbonization by mid-century so that there finally is the global understanding and orientation of how to get to net zero in a timely way this is all going to be on the agenda I think we have a big leadership role to play because of your leadership and because of Europe's unique leadership role in the global agenda and this I find very promising so let me conclude where I started with great thanks for a wonderful report and a wonderful initiative by Angelo for your leadership on all of this it's a tremendous contribution and a very exciting one Thank you Thank you very much, Professor Sacks I would ask to Professor Angelo Riccaboni to a final remark Okay, thank you Simone, thanks everybody I thank Ricardo for his effective presentation the representatives of SDSN for their remarks we will take notice of it but also our friends from UFM for the Mediterranean I think that it's very important this cooperation between SDSN Med, SDSN in general and UFM, I know that Jeffrey really shared this view and he's very positive in this link between SDSN and UFM and I think we will be able with this cooperation to promote transformations and changes that are needed in the Mediterranean I also thank UNEP MEP for their remarks and I'm sure that the cooperation with them also will be effective just a few seconds to say to answer to Jeffrey I completely agree that we should work in order to make initiatives by Europe considering also the Mediterranean area because challenges do not know borders so we should push or we should convince Europe that the European Green Deal or initiatives related to sustainability should also have an African and Mediterranean scope because if there are problems a few kilometers from France they will affect also France or Italy or Spain all of them so I think this is a very important point the second point is that as you said we need to involve more and more researchers and civil society from the south and the east so this year it was the first year that the report was made according to the HABS idea to have six HABS for the six transformations but the next step will be to associate to each HABS also one institution from the south and the east so to have for each transformation two research innovation references one from the north and one from the south so this is an example of the principle of equal footing which is very very important to promote sustainability so UFM is a clear example of the principle of equal footing and we want to go ahead according to this line because only together we can make it so I would like to stop here thanks a lot Jeffrey for your inspiration and for your leadership we are very pleased to contribute to the SDSM network initiatives and we look forward to the next event and the next activity thank you very much indeed thanks again I asked all of you to turn on your cameras for the final greetings and want to thank you all very much for your intervention your contribution your thoughts we are happy to collaborate with you all for the new edition of the report I would like also to thanks SDSM Italia Sabinaratti and the colleagues from SDSM Italia for the interesting consideration on this report and we are excited to start to collaborate with all of you for the new edition of the 2021 so thank you very much again I stop here and we hope to give a good contribution for the transformation of the Mediterranean area thank you bye bye thank you thank you very much thank you thank you very much bye bye thanks to all of you wonderful bye bye