On May 21st, the BlueInvest Initiative organized a virtual workshop called “Financing a Sustainable Blue Economy: From Pipe Dream To Pipeline”. At the workshop, industry experts spoke about the current state of financing for a sustainable Blue Economy.
This was part of the European Maritime Day (EMD), an annual two-day event where “Ocean Leaders Meet” to catch up on the blue economy and the maritime environment.
During the event, experts spoke about recent initiatives to scale up investments towards a green transition and green recovery and future opportunities for financing.
The workshop was kicked off by speakers from European Commission’s Directorate-General for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries – DG MARE – and CINEA that talked about the current problems in the industry and the European Union’s Green Deal.
The following panel discussion, Supporting Investment Towards a Sustainable Blue Economy – Looking Back, Looking Ahead, was focused on the state of green/blue financing. It was an opportunity for speakers to present the current initiatives, including BlueInvest, and the need for general principles for Sustainable Blue Economy Finance. Those principles should include the vision and a common framework for creating a sustainable blue economy.
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The final part of the workshop presented three of the European Union’s blue projects and two founders of startups working on solutions against marine litter.
The three EU blue projects included the InvestEU Portal, the Horizon Results Platform, and the BlueInvest Project. All three of those were able to showcase their history, goals, and achievements so attending investors, policymakers, entrepreneurs, and researchers could learn more and possibly get involved.
The two companies that presented their solution for marine litter were marGnet and OCEANETS.
MarGnet project is focused on “multi-level solutions to monitor, map, prevent, remove and recycle marine litter from sea-based sources present on the sea floor”.
While OCEANETS is focused on circular economy solutions in terms of prevention, recover, re-use and recycle of fishing gears to obtain added-value products in the textile industry” (OCEANETS).
The final remarks of the event were by Catherine Frideres, Senior Manager, of BlueInvest. She pointed that with all the current initiatives, we are taking the right steps for financing a sustainable Blue Economy, but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed here by Impakter.com contributors are their own, not those of Impakter.com —
