The cooperation project between Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Libyan municipalities in the fisheries sector ended last December; the project led to a fruitful collaboration between the two countries and issued important documents relating to fishing and the legislative and procedural path necessary for obtain EU certification for fish products. The documents are available on request at the address: project-libia@informest.it

Since 2015, the European Committee of the Regions has developed significant political relations with Libyan municipalities. Friuli Venezia Giulia Autonomous Region was the first Italian region to adhere to the "Nicosia Initiative", a bottom-up approach for the reconstruction of the Libyan territory which starts from the local authorities and branches off along various sectors of intervention, including also the fishing sector.

In 2018, thanks to a funding opportunity by the Italian Ministry of Interior, Friuli Venezia Giulia Region continued this process by entrusting Informest with the implementation of the PATH DEV project - Pilot action in the fisheries sector for Libyan economic development. The 24-month-long project developed specific training activities in Friuli Venezia Giulia both for civil servants responsible for the fishing, veterinary hygiene and food safety sectors, and for economic operators, fishermen and professional school trainers coming from Tripoli, Sirte, Benghazi and Tobrouk.

Thanks to the close collaboration with Legacoop FVG (Association of Cooperatives), OGS (National Institute of Oceanography and Experimental Geophysics) and with the support of the regional veterinary public health department, the health agencies, Trieste Coast Guard, ARPA FVG (Regional Agency for the Environmental Protection), Informest has carried out four activities training courses, in which more than 50 Libyan representatives took part for a total of 24 days of classroom training and 11 visits to the most important regional companies in the fish, fish and maricultural sector, as well as to universities, research institutes, marine areas protected and zoo prophylaxis institutes.

As part of the project, an Italian-Libyan working group has prepared an Assessment document of the Libyan tangible and intangible heritage in the fish sector, which collects updated data on the structural and infrastructural endowment of the Libyan coastal cities. The document presents the Italian and Arabic versions and is available to those who request at the following address: project-libia@informest.it.

In addition, it is also possible to request the other documents that have been produced as part of the project activities. They are:

1. List of the legislative EC references for the fishing sector (Italian version and Arabic version);
2. EC Delegated Regulation of 04/03/2019 (Italian version and Arabic version);
3. Methodology of the training course for operators in the fishing sector (Italian version and Arabic version);
4. VADEMECUM: The model of FVG (Friuli Venezia Giulia) of the fishing and aquaculture system: transferability of good practices to the Libyan fish sector (Italian version and Arabic version);

To also request these documents, write to the address: project-libia@informest.it  indicating which document you are interested in.

Arabic version