Mission to define priority projects within MedCities Action Plan 2018.

The President of the UM of Mennieh shared an overview of the demographic situation in the union which includes 5 municipalities with a total population of about 100.000 inhabitants and faces the challenge to host 35.000 Syrian refugees. This fact poses additional challenges to provide municipal services. The Union invited MedCities to join a common action in 2018 to raise awareness and facilitating waste sorting at source at schools in the five cities of the union.  A visit to the Unions sorting plan was organized in this framework.

The meeting in Tripoli focused on the Catalan partners funded project “Integrated Solid Waste Management in Al Fayhaa (ISWMF)” implemented in cooperation with UNDP and was the occasion for a high level meeting of Tripoli Mayor, Catalan Agency for Cooperation and Development General Director and the UNDP North Lebanon Area manager.

Developing sustainable tourism based on natural and cultural heritage is a top priority for Zgharta-Ehden, the UM of Batroun and the UM of Jounieh; all of them having the need for “territorial branding” on their development agenda.  This fact would certainly justify a knowledge sharing based capacity building collaboration within the network. Batroun region further priorities the establishment of a Project management unit as an intermediate structure while they manage to establish a Development Office. The Mayor of Jounieh further presented the priorities of the city at the environment, public transportation and human resources level.

All municipalities were informed on and invited to the upcoming MedCities General Assembly which will be hold in Barcelona next 4th and 5th of October.