November 9, 2020

Opening the conversation on Critical Infrastructures in the Med, first webinar of the UNIMED SubNetwork on Safety and Critical Infrastructures

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The issue of Safety and Security of Critical Infrastructures is increasingly taking a crucial importance for local developments, including its relation to social and environmental issues. The sector is also gaining importance in research and cooperation in international and community programming, and there is a need for a growth of international exchanges in the field and the circulation of good practices. That is why we firmly believed it was time for the SubNetwork to come alive!

The recently launched SubNetwork on Safety and Security of Critical Infrastructures has organized its first webinar on October 28, 2020, titled Opening the conversation on Critical Infrastructures in the Med. Riding on the wave of the enthusiasm of our Associated Universities towards the topic, UNIMED in collaboration with the SubNetwork Coordinator the University of Salento, invited all members to take part in the online event to know each other, learn more on what Universities do in the field of Critical Infrastructures in the Med and jointly discuss the SubNetwork action plan for the upcoming months.

The participation in the webinar was very wide, with more than 30 attendees from Italy, Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Libya, Cyprus and Tunisia. The SubNetwork itself counts up-to-date on 22 Universities from 12 countries, with a wide range of disciplines involved. It proves that the issue of Critical Infrastructures is a common priority, which goes beyond North and South, and beyond a single department. The scope of the SubNetwork is indeed to allow knowledge exchange and generate a fruitful debate among the members in the region.

 

During the webinar, the University of Salento shared a proposed set of activities for the SubNetwork, from developing a catalogue of resources to drafting a joint publication, from cooperation projects to virtual mobility, from the organization of thematic webinars to social media animation. To start, SubNetwork members will work on a common understanding and definition of Critical Infrastructures in the Med region, and later move towards setting common goals and implementing joint initiatives.

In 2021, the SubNetwork will focus on the following activities:
Mapping the competences of the SubNetwork members.
Sharing of resources and publications, to define the state-of-the-art of research on CRI in the Euro-Mediterranean region, to activate knowledge exchange and create a common background.
Organization  of two thematic workshops, open to the public and to other partners (i.e. other universities, private actors, other UNIMED SNs, etc). The idea is to organize two webinars per year, facilitated by one SN member upon its main topic of interest.
As a side activity, UNIMED is also working on the SubNetwork visual identity and on the setting of a virtual collaborative space for advancing in the collaboration.
 Lines of cooperation.jpg

 

Shall you be interested in joining the SubNetwork, you can register your institution by writing to unimed@uni-med.net.