Coop to Coast project: European and Turkish Cooperation for the Development of Coastal Territories

On 16 December 2020, the transnational cooperation EU-Turkey Coops to Coast held its final capitalisation event, organised by the Black Sea Science Technology and Culture Association and Haliéus Italy (leading partners). The project aimed to develop diversification activities focused on tourism in two Black Sea local areas in Turkey (Rize and Artvin) based on the European experience, including the CLLD approach, and promoting cooperation between local fishing associations and civil society organisations.

This virtual event offered the opportunity for project members and other CLLD stakeholders, to jointly discuss how to foster this approach empowering local communities, promoting the public-private-civil society communications, and supporting small-scale fisher entrepreneurship (for example, developing the legal basis for pesca-tourism in Turkey).

During this meeting, the VeGAL FLAG was invited to share its expertise of local community empowerment and diversification; and moreover, FARNET was invited to showcase supporting tools for cooperation (such as cooperation articles, like the one included in the 18^th FARNET Magazine, for the Mediterranean, and Guides), as well as a number of successful good practices implemented by FLAGs on diversification.