In the last days of July 2022, ENSERES partners visited Tyre, the splendid Lebanese coastal city which, together with Sfax in Tunisia, is at the centre of the capitalization project financed by ENI CBC MED. The event, organized by TCNR (Tyre Coastal Nature Reserve), ETC-UMA (European Topic Center, University of Malaga) and MedCities, has been an important opportunity to bring together all the stakeholders involved in the creation of an integrated management system, capable of protecting the environmental value and trigger a sustainable development, restoring the balance between economy and nature.

The first scheduled meeting took place at the TCNR facilities, located along the magnificent beach of Tyre, one of the few uncontaminated shores along the 220 kilometers that make up the Lebanese coast. Here the general situation of the Reserve and the first actions carried out within the project were discussed. Subsequently, the ENSERES team moved to the town hall, where Mayor Hassan Dbouk illustrated the pressure factors that the Reserve is facing, and the strategies implemented by the municipal institutions. The sandy shores, the sea, the ponds, the animal and plant species, the precious archaeological sites of Tire face the negative consequences of excessive anthropogenic pressure, which risks eroding the immense ecosystem and cultural heritage of a place that has been a protagonist of Mediterranean history since the Phoenician era.

For this reason, during the first day the dialogue with the municipal authorities and experts, with fishers, farmers and operators in the tourist sector was fundamental: only a collective strategy can restore the lost harmony between man and nature. The value of Tyre and its environmental heritage manifested itself with all its strength during the visit to the archaeological sites and the fascinating boat trip along the coast.

Dialogue and knowledge were necessary to face the second day of the visit, during which the project partners took turns in explaining the toolkit provided by ENSERES, discussed which tools are most appropriate, the methods and times of implementation. The real needs of the territory have thus found specific answers. “We decided to focus on three main tools: marine litter, monitoring marine biodiversity and financial training.”, says Ali Badreddine, marine biologist of TCNR, who also stresses that “ENSERES is a great opportunity for Tyre. The project gives us the chance to build out capacity from within, in a bottom-up process. At the same time it is capable of inserting the Reserve in a net of other Mediterranean marine protected areas”. 

During the workshop the actions of ENSERES have been framed within the other projects working in Tire and its Reserve, Med4EBM, COMMON, PlasticBusterCAP, BioConnect and BlueTyre. The workshop was attended by 20 people, representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture, the TCNR, the technical offices of the municipality of Tyre, the Association for the Development of Agricultural Capacity and representatives from the fishing community. Among those were also present the experts of ACE4CE, one of the three NGOs that have been awarded the subgrants of the ENSERES project, also the subject of study and debate.

Altogether, two dense, fundamental days for Tyre and ENSERES, as underlined by Christoph Schröder, project manager at ETC-UMA and one of the representatives of the visiting group:  "The visit to the Tyre Coast Nature Reserve has provided a very detailed overview of the territorial and socio-ecological challenges of the protected area and its surroundings. It has become clear that the management and sustainable use of its natural and cultural resources require adapted tools to be applied that are available in the ENSERES toolkit. Now, local stakeholders from fishing to tourism operators have the chance to get trained in applying these tools to the benefit of their livelihoods and the affected ecosystems."