Skip to main content
European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency
News article25 May 2021

CINEA in the spotlight at the 2021 European Maritime Day - A Green recovery for a Sustainable Blue economy

European Maritime Day 2021
CINEA

The 2021 Edition of the European Maritime Day - A Green recovery for a Sustainable Blue economy - has just concluded, with CINEA participating in many of the sessions organised over the two day period of the conference.

This year’s highlights was on the newly adopted Commission Communication on a Sustainable Blue Economy, a strategy to link Blue economy with the EU Green Deal and the recovery strategy, as well as on the brand new 2021 Blue economy report and the new aquaculture guidelines adopted on 12 May 2021.

On Thursday 20 May 2021, over hundred participants took part to the CINEA “Bringing blue/green innovation to market“ live pitching session, where 4 EMFF projects pitched their business proposition to 5 highly experienced investors across Europe.

The objective of the session was to offer 4 selected companies running EMFF projects a direct and fast-track access to potential investors and facilitate their access to market after EU funding. The session was organised with the support of the BLUEINVEST platform.

The companies proposed solutions in the field of aquaculture, blue biotechnology and offshore wind.

Stephen Wann from Zoan BIOMED (Ireland) pitched the solution developed under CORAL4HEALTH to substitute bone gratfing with sustainably farmed corals for medical orthopaedics devices. Esteban Camacho (Spain) from RDC presented the innovative mollusc farms developed under OPENMODE for intensive shellfish farming in open waters. Zurine Varela from Xabet (Spain) presented the digital platform developed under DOCC OFF to monitor critical components of offshore wind turbines. Thomas Flanagan from Eires Composites (Ireland) pitched about their disruptive technology and composite material developed under the LEAPWIND project to address the problem of wind turbine blades erosion.

On 21 May, the BLUEINVEST session - Financing a Sustainable Blue Economy: From Pipe Dream to Pipeline (Flash report and presentations available) - gathered over 100 (virtual) participants who discussed the state of play of blue financing, and the challenges ahead for the coming years. Three projects pipelines developed under InvestEU, Horizon results platform and BLUEINVEST were also presented to the audience.  To bring some concrete examples to the discussion, two EMFF projects, OCEANETS and MARGNET presented their case for recycling marine litter from fishing gear and turning them into new products.

Marine pollution was also on top of the agenda of a dedicated LIFE virtual workshop on Thursday 20 May to hear how the LIFE programme addresses marine pollution. The aim of the workshop was to demonstrate LIFE’s ability to finance projects addressing a wide range of marine pollution issues but also the programme’s flexibility in terms of different project features.

For this purpose the workshop showcased six very different LIFE projects, addressing different marine pollution topics (marine litter and navigation/shipping pressures) with different approaches (from innovative projects, to best-practice, governance and awareness raising), different scales (from small/focused projects to large national/regional strategic projects) and diverse participation (from single to multi beneficiary projects, involving authorities, industry, academia, NGOs, etc.).

Details

Publication date
25 May 2021