On 14 and 16 July, EuroMeSCo held the Connect and Kick Off Meetings of three out of the five Joint Study Groups 2020. The aim of these meetings, involving experts and policymakers, is to bring the members of the Joint Study Groups closer to ongoing policy debates in different EU and regional institutions, thus ensuring a policy-oriented approach throughout their research.

During the meetings, the Coordinators of the three Joint Study Groups presented their research proposals to an audience of between 10-20 experts and policy stakeholders with the aim of receiving their feedbacks on the objectives, structure, approach and methodology of the research project. Each group, made up of a selection of 4-6 experts from different think tanks and research institutes of the Euro-Mediterranean region, will jointly produce a Policy Study to be released in the first quarter of 2021.

The three kicked off Joint Study Groups will tackle issues such as: post-Covid-19 EU-MENA-Africa trade relations, under the coordination of Katarzyna Sidlo (Center for Social and Economic Research, CASE); the fight against human smuggling in the Mediterranean and beyond, coordinated by Gabriella Sanchez (Migration Policy Centre, European University Institute, EUI); and the transition towards green economy in the MENA region, led by Julia Choucair-Vizoso (Arab Reform Initiative, ARI, & Elcano Royal Institute). The other two Joint Study Groups, on Covid-19 related opportunities for terrorist groups and cybersecurity in the MENA region, will hold their Connect & Kick Off Meetings in September.

EuroMeSCo is a network of 104 think tanks and research institutes from 29 different Euro-Mediterranean countries coordinated by the European Institute of the Mediterranean (IEMed) and currently implementing the project “EuroMeSCo: Connecting the dots”, co-funded by the EU and the IEMed.

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