Valencia, Spain, 9th and 10th September, 2013: Under the activities of the project entitled “Promoting Socio-economic Sustainable Development through Innovative Technological Actions for Mediterranean Tourism Heritage and Landscapes Protection Clusters (HELAND)”, the Applied Research Institute- Jerusalem (ARIJ) represented by Nader Hrimat, Fahd Abu Sayma and Saher Alkhouri attended the Second Steering Committee and Technical Committee meeting of project entitled HELAND.
The main goal of the conducted two days meeting was to have technical and conceptual discussions as well as to present the updates regarding the progresses achieved on technical, administrative and financial levels by each partner organization during the project’s first year. Furthermore, the action plan for the second year was developed and approved by the project partners.
In the second day, ARIJ’s project team gave a presentation about the project activities in Palestine, especially about the selected pilot site to study a landscape protection practices in Al Badhan Village in Nablus Governorate. This area is known as a touristic area due to the presence of several water springs, waterfalls and rich biodiversity, and is classified as protected area by the national land protection plan which was developed by Ministry of Planning. The meeting included a site visit to Valencia’s project Pilot site.
HELAND Project Promoting Socio-economic Sustainable Development through Innovative Technological Actions for Mediterranean Tourism-Heritage and Landscapes Protection Clusters (HELAND) is a research project funded by the Cross-Border Cooperation within the European Neighborhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI), Mediterranean Sea Basin Joint Operational Programme. It is a joint project between ten organizations and research centers from six countries: Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan, Spain, Cyprus and Malta. The Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (ARIJ) is the Palestinian partner of the project and its case study is landscape protection.