FORESTERRA Management Committee Meeting, Paris, France, 6-7 May 2013

A meeting of the FORESTERRA Management Committee took place in Paris, France, on 6-7 May 2013. The venue was the CIHEAM’s General Secretariat headquarters, located at 11, rue Newton, 75116 Paris.

The objective of the meeting was to review and discuss the progress in the different workpackages and future plans.

The meeting was opened by Plácido Plaza, Principal Administrator at the General Secretariat of CIHEAM in Paris, and David González from MINECO, Madrid, Spain, as FORESTERRA Coordinator.

The first presentation was made by Florence Jacquet, from INRA, France, and the ARIMNET ERA-NET Coordinator. She presented their experience with the ARIMNET Call for Proposals for projects, which was similar to the one to be launched by FORESTERRA. This call had a common pot of 6.46M€. 86 proposals were submitted in the ARIMNET call, 79 proposals and 10 projects were selected for funding. The average budget for each project was 600,000 Euros.

During the first day of the meeting, the Workpackage leaders presented their progress and future plans. The WP2 - Mapping research activities results already obtained were presented by Giuseppe Scarascia, from CRA Italy. Jean Charles Valette, from INRA, France, explained how the exchange of the information obtained had been planned and implemented. These results are already available at the FORESTERRA web.

For WP3 (“Strategic activities”), Marc Palahí, from EFIMED, presented the FORESTERRA Strategic Scientific Plan, including the strategic research themes, and the possible options for joint activities.

WP4 (“Implementation of joint activities”) progress and outlook, was introduced by Jean Charles Valette, from INRA, Victoria Sanz, from EFIMED and Hamed Daly, from IRESA).

WP6 (Scientific cooperation with other Mediterranean Climate Areas”) progress and outlook was presented by Joana Pinheiro, FCT, Portugal. A common survey template to identify and describe the main funding programmes and research topics addressed in the different MCAs has been developed. It will be completed by the MCA partners and exploited via the FORESTERRA Web as is done for WP2.

WP7 (“Spreading excellence”) progress and outlook was presented by Dunixi Gabiña, IAMZ-CIHEAM. A new version of the Web site was launched, including the WP2 database, dissemination documents and the intranet, where all relevant FORESTERRA documentation is available for the partners. He also informed that FORESTERRA news will be included in the EFIMED newsletter monthly and that the second issue of the FORESTERRA Newsletter will appear soon.

During the second day, the selection of topics for the joint competitive call to be launched by FORESTERRA, and the identification of possible procedures for transnational call for proposals: documentation, calendar, selection procedures, monitoring, etc, were presented by Marc Palahí, EFIMED, David González, MINECO and Elena Capolino, MIPAAF. Presentations were followed by a very active general discussion about FORESTERRA common call, which will probably be launched by the end of 2013.

David González, MINECO, Spain and Victoria Sanz, EFIMED, presented some administrative issues such as the Amendments of the Grant Agreement and the 1st periodic reporting to the EC.

The meeting was closed by the Coordinator, David González, MINECO, Spain.

At the end of the meeting, participants were invited to an excellent Turkish buffet offered by CIHEAM. In the afternoon a cultural visit to the Arc de Triomphe was organised.