eMSP NBSR at 2nd Our Baltic Conference

The European Commission organised 2^nd Our Baltic Conference in Palanga (Lithuania) on 29 September 2023.

This high-level event brought together ministers from the 8 EU countries surrounding the Baltic Sea (Denmark, Germany, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Finland and Sweden). The eMSP NBSR project had a chance to contribute and present own expected results in joint work done in several emerging and cross-cutting MSP topics in the North and Baltic seas.

Commissioner for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries Virginijus Sinkevičius and ministers looked at what has been achieved since the first Our Baltic Conference in 2020, and what still needs to be done. There was special focus on unexploded munitions from World Wars, as some 300 000 tonnes of unexploded munitions still lie at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, causing pollution and preventing the development of economic activities at sea.

VASAB Secretariat was invited to the Conference to present the spatial planning cooperation in the Baltic Sea Region, its recent Vision 2040, as well as showcasing a good example of established cooperation platform between the two sea basins of Baltic and North seas within the eMSP NBSR project (Emerging ecosystem-based Maritime Spatial Planning topics in North and Baltic Sea Regions).

More information on the 2nd Our Baltic Conference is here.

Prepared by Margarita Vološina (VASAB Secretariat) October, 2023