During all its duration, the Alboran project, "Common management of a natural cross-border space", aimed to join economic development with environment, contribute to a better structuring of the Alboran Sea, and to promote a sustainable and integrated management of its environment.

The Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning of Junta of Andalucia ("Consejería de Medio Ambiente y Ordenación de la Junta de Andalucía" in Spanish), the IUCN Center for Mediterranean Cooperation and the University of Almeria participated as beneficiary partners. We can also note the participation of the National Institute for Halieutic Research (INRH in French) of the Ministry of Agriculture and Maritime Fishing ("Ministère de l'agriculture et des pêches maritimes" in French), as a Moroccan participant partner.

The activities leads by IUCN-Med have been the following:

1.1. Creation of an "Alboran" technologic platform, for conservation and sustainable development

• News about the technical meetings of georeferenced information experts groups
• Training workshops about geoportals, hold in Tanger
• Prototype of an "Alboran Sea Geoportal" (under construction)

1.2. Meeting with traditional fishing stakeholders

• Traditional Fishing Workshop, Alhoucemas, 31st of May - 1st of June 2014

1.3. Cooperative work groups (Biodiversity, Marine Protected Areas, and Integrated Management of Coastal Zones)

• I Technical Meeting of the work groups: Protected Marine Areas, Biodiversity (cetaceans and marine turtles), Integrated management of coastal zones, Global change.
• II Meeting of the work group about cetaceans and marine turtles
• Records of the cetaceans of the Alboran Sea
• Records of the marine turtles of the Alboran Sea
• Report about the Alboran Sea Marine Protected Areas
• Recommendations of the Marine Protected Areas work group about the adaptation of the Antalya road map on the Alboran Sea.
• Summary of the three workshops lead by the expert group about the Integrated Management of Alboran Sea coastal zones.
• Pooling of projects ideas for the development of the GIZC in Andalusia and in the Alboran Sea.

1.4. Progress of the Initial Evaluation, in compliance with the Marine Strategy, at the "Cap des Trois Fourches" (Morocco)

• Informative and awareness document about the "Cap des Trois Fourches" (available soon)

1.5. Production of a Cooperative Proposal for the creation of a Marine Environment Management Center on the South side

• Work document for the creation of an Environmental Awareness Center on the Alboran Sea South side

III Alboran Conference, Almeria 17-19 June 2014.Have been presented the results of the project, and three work documents about governance, biodiversity, global change, society and natural resources have been debated.

The activities 1 and 3 implemented by IUCN-Med counted on the support of the Biodiversity Foundation of the Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Environment.

The Alboran project is part of the Spain-External Cross-Border Co-operation Programme (POCTEFEX), which is a European initiative aiming to promote the collaboration between Spain and Morocco, through the support of the European Fund for Regional Development (FEDER in French). The POCTEFEX-Alboran project started in 2012 and ended in June 2014.

More information : Andrés Alcántara