On the 2nd of May, the BlueForesting promoter organized a full day dedicated to the project where partners and stakeholders participated.

In the morning, the consortium had its official kick-off meeting, where the partners – CIIMAR, AKVPLAN-NIVA, NIVA, MARE-IPLeiria, CIBIO-BIOPOLIS, and SeaForester – presented their tasks and what has already been achieved since the beginning of the project.

In the afternoon, more than 20 stakeholders from the northern Portuguese region and from conservation and management entities got together with some of the partners in a joint event at CIIMAR, to discuss the future of Marine Forests in Portugal. The different backgrounds of the people participating transformed the session into a very productive brainstorm where different approaches for the management and conservation of marine forests were discussed.

We will continue to explore this within the project’s framework, and hopefully, new and concrete actions will arise from these societal collaborations.