An inventory of research initiatives and stakeholders on Climate Change, Resources Efficiency and Raw Material in the Mediterranean and Black Sea: methodology and results

The knowledge about existing networking and research initiatives in the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions is fundamental for achieving the main goal of fostering sustainability and uptake of research results through networking activities. The European project IASON addresses those needs implementing an operational instrument enabling collection and provision of information about the relations between existing networking and research activities in the two areas. To this aim a database of initiatives and stakeholders has been developed. It is currently operated and it will be maintained up-to-date throughout the duration of the project and possibly beyond. This Initiatives and Stakeholders database allows to carry out further analysis, identify gaps and needs, and define informed action plans. The previous experience from the European project BalkanGeoNet on building a Permanent Networking Facility (PNF) for the Balkan region was considered positive and it was decided to replicate and adapt it. Therefore, the IASON Initiative and Stakeholders database was designed based on the BalkanGeoNet PNF database structure, to build a IASON PNF. The database has been filled collecting information from relevant initiatives provided by the IASON consortium. To this aim, an online questionnaire has been set up to collect elements on the identified initiatives. The responses to the questionnaire have been analyzed to provide a report about Existing Thematic Networks in the Mediterranean and Black Sea regions. The analysis shows that the information collected mainly covers EU-funded projects and therefore further activities is needed to include information about national/regional initiatives in the IASON PNF. EU-funded projects have been considered a valuable source of existing or potential networking actions in the target regions.