The steering committee of the Blue Mediterranean Partnership (BMP), a partnership that aims to tackle the Mediterranean Sea’s severe environmental threats by coordinating the financing of sustainable blue economy projects in the region, met for the first time ever at the Union for the Mediterranean’s headquarters in Barcelona. Acting as the facilitator of political and regulatory dialogue, the UfM hosted donors, implementing partners, and beneficiary countries who identified more than 15 sustainable blue economy projects in Morocco, Egypt, and Jordan for a total investment cost of more than €2.5bn.

The Blue Mediterranean Partnership was officially launched at COP27 in December 2022 when key partners expressed wide political support for the creation of a new partnership. Consequently, on 15 November 2023, the EBRD in its capacity as fund manager, established a new Blue Mediterranean Partnership Cooperation Fund with General Conditions approved by the EBRD Board of Directors. At COP28 in November 2023, the partners stepped up their commitments by signing statements of intent to participate in the Partnership as enshrined in the BMP Partnership Framework.

The BMP Implementing Partners are multilateral development banks, development financial institutions and international organizations whose policies and procedures are in line with international best practices, and who have signed a statement of intent. So far, the following Implementing Partners have signed statements of intent: AFD, EBRD, EIB, CDP, KfW and UfM. Implementing financial institutions will be able to benefit from the grants provided by the BMP Fund mobilizing also existing financial resources provided by the European Commission through the Neighborhood Investment Platform (NIP) and the EFSD+.

The beneficiary countries, Jordan, Morocco, and Egypt will lead the identification of strategic blue economy projects in their territories while the Union for the Mediterranean will act as facilitator of the political and regulatory dialogue.