On October 29, the students of the ICTA-UAB Master of Interdisciplinary Studies in Environmental, Economic and Social Sustainability were able to attend again the inauguration of the new academic year of the International University Campus for Mediterranean Biosphere Reserves. This Campus was created five years ago through an agreement between the Abertis Foundation and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB).

The director of the Foundation and the UNESCOMED center, Georgina Flamme, was in charge of opening the event by welcoming the students to the Castellet Castle, headquarters of the UNESCOMED center and the Abertis Foundation.

Then, Dr. Roser Maneja (Scientific Director of the UNESCOMED center and Deputy Director of Research of the Center for Forest Science and Technology of Catalonia, CTFC), gave a brief presentation of the CTFC. Since the beginning of this year, the CTFC has been the responsible for the technical and scientific coordination of the UNESCOMED center, thanks to an agreement signed with the Abertis Foundation.

To close this first session, the technical coordinator of the UNESCOMED Center, Dr. Sara Martínez (CTFC), and the coordinator of the Edu-BioMed program, Antonio Bontempi (ICTA-UAB), explained the work carried out at the UNESCOMED center. Edu-BioMed is an Erasmus + program for the creation of educational capacities and applied research in the Mediterranean Biosphere Reserves. The proposal for this program was promoted by the UNESCOMED center and initially funded by the Abertis Foundation.

The event continued with an inspiring conference by the Deputy Head of the CTFC's Landscape Dynamics and Biodiversity program, Gerard Bota. The students of the Master had the opportunity to learn and discuss with this expert in biodiversity conservation both the possible difficulties and the solutions available when transferring the results of scientific research to biodiversity management and conservation plans. The managers of the MedMab network were able to follow this conference online. The recording will be available soon on the website of the UNESCOMED Center.

To close the event, the coordinator of the Master, Eduard Ariza, thanked, on behalf of all the students and the UAB, the invitation to this event by the Abertis Foundation, emphasizing how important these public-private partnerships are, and the enormous effort that is appreciated after the work of the UNESCOMED Center.

Finally, in her farewell to the students, Dr. Maneja encouraged them to finish their training as experts in sustainability: “We still have a lot of work to do and we need you. You are the future. We need people like you to help us with these tasks and this challenge, which is to bring science to decision-making, and vice versa ”.