A high-level gathering for Mediterranean landscape resilience
In November 2025, ResAlliance brought together policymakers, researchers, farmers, foresters and experts from across the Mediterranean for its final policy forum, marking a major milestone in the project’s efforts to advance climate-resilient landscape management. The event, attended by around 90 participants from 31 countries, was organized in collaboration with CIFOR-ICRAF, the Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania and featured representatives from the Spanish Ministry of Ecological Transition, the Lebanese Ministry of Agriculture and the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM). The forum provided an opportunity to present the ResAlliance white paper on Mediterranean landscape resilience and to discuss how its findings can shape future policies across the region.
A region under pressure: the need for coordinated action
The Mediterranean is warming 20% faster than the global average, facing increasingly severe droughts, wildfires and biodiversity loss. These challenges are compounded by land abandonment, rapid socioeconomic change and fragmented governance frameworks. Despite having a long history of human-shaped landscapes, the region struggles with outdated legislation, insufficient financing for nature-based solutions and a lack of coordination across sectors and borders. The policy forum emphasized the urgent need for coherent, cross-sectoral action to ensure long-term landscape resilience.
Insights from the policy dialogue: six strategic directions for the future
Building on the extensive knowledge generated throughout the project, the policy forum distilled six strategic directions to guide future Mediterranean landscape policies:
Integration across sectors and borders
Participants stressed that integrated, cross-sectoral and transboundary collaboration is essential. Agricultural, forestry, water and nature-based solution policies remain too fragmented to tackle complex climate impacts. Stronger multilevel governance—giving local and regional actors a voice in national decisions—and enhanced EU–non-EU dialogue through platforms such as the UfM are crucial for overcoming institutional silos.
Sustainable management through better policy alignment
The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) remains a central tool for promoting sustainable land management, but the forum highlighted the need for deeper alignment with local policies, monitoring systems and EU classifications of farming practices. The upcoming CAP revision offers an opportunity to shift toward result-based incentives and to improve coordination with programmes such as Interreg Euro-Med.
Two-way cooperation between EU and non-EU countries
Climate challenges often hit Southern and Eastern Mediterranean countries first, making South-to-North knowledge exchange indispensable. Participants emphasized that successful cooperation must be based on mutual learning, legislative awareness and long-term planning to ensure the effective transfer of practices such as water-efficient rainfed agriculture or wildfire prevention strategies.
Digital innovation and the empowerment of women and youth
Scaling resilience requires strong digital tools, accessible extension services and the active involvement of women and young people. However, digital solutions must be affordable, available offline and adapted to local languages. Support for rural entrepreneurship in agri-food, ecotourism and forest restoration is key to unlocking innovation across the region.
Inclusive participation for stronger local ownership
Public–social–private partnerships (PSPPs) and payments for ecosystem services (PES) can significantly boost local engagement and resource availability. These mechanisms complement traditional funding sources, strengthen community involvement and reward positive environmental outcomes. Regional initiatives such as GreenerMed and UfM platforms play an important role in sharing best practices.
Innovative financing for long-term resilience
Non-EU Mediterranean countries face unique barriers in accessing large international funds. The forum underscored the need for clear coordination among international organizations, donor agencies and national institutions to avoid duplication and ensure that projects are demand-driven. The Green Climate Fund and other global mechanisms remain important but require streamlined access pathways.
ResAlliance’s role in advancing Mediterranean resilience
Over its three-year duration, the EU-funded ResAlliance project united 16 partners and hundreds of practitioners through the LandNet community and five territorial LandLabs. These platforms facilitated shared learning, capacity building and the identification of practical solutions to climate challenges. The project also produced more than 120 factsheets, a wide set of publications and the comprehensive white paper presented during the policy forum.
Looking ahead: embedding resilience into policy frameworks
The forum concluded that building long-term Mediterranean resilience requires moving beyond isolated projects and integrating solutions into European and national policies. The insights gathered through ResAlliance come at a critical time, aligning with upcoming updates to the CAP, the EU nature restoration law and the soil strategy. Embedding the six strategic directions—integration, sustainable management, two-way cooperation, digital innovation, inclusive participation and innovative financing—into national adaptation plans will help align actions across borders and sectors.
With its collection of knowledge, proven solutions and multi-actor dialogue, ResAlliance leaves a strong foundation for future initiatives across the Mediterranean Basin. The continued availability of its outputs through EU-FarmBook ensures that the lessons learned will inform policies, partnerships and investments for years to come.