On Saturday May 26, 2012,Her Royal Highness Princess Lalla Hasnaa, President of the Mohammed VI Foundation forEnvironmental Protection (FM6E),presided the award ceremony for the 2011Clean Beaches Lalla Hasnaa Awards at the Mohammed VI International Conference Center in Skhirat, Morocco.
Recommendationsfor sustainable coastal management and development were defined and presented from the workshop, Areas for Development of the Clean Beaches Program,organized in conjunction with this ceremony.
During this annual event, Her Royal Highness Princess Lalla Hasnaa awarded the trophies to the Clean Beaches partners, honored for their remarkable actions and initiatives towards the protection of our coastal heritage.
The 2011 program year, which extended its activities to 64 beaches covering 36 coastal communesand was supported by 28 public and private organizations, aimed to consolidate gains. In 2011, 20 beaches were awarded the Blue Flag label.
The ceremony includedtheatrical moments with the Cultural Communication and DevelopmentAssociation fromRabat, which produced a novel puppet show entitled,Scene from the Life of the Boundif Family,highlighting the human threats towards the coast.
Also, the Mohammed VI Foundation for Environmental Protection exhibited a selection of photographs of Moroccan beaches taken by its partners to show the Kingdom’s coast in its different facets on the theme, Beach Life.
Alongside this celebration, the FM6Eorganized an interactive workshopto take inventory ofa decade of experience in beach management. This meeting brought together all the Clean Beaches program partners: economic operators, government involved in coastal management, as well as local authorities, communities, and associations.
Several strategic guidancediscussions took place during this workshop.
First, the participants attended the presentation of the studycarried outby FM6Eentitled, Study on the Strategic Guidance and Development of theClean Beaches program:towards a National Coastal Management Program.
Next, the upgrading of the Moroccan Bathing WaterQuality Monitoring standard perthe New European Directive was discussed.Since 2012, the New European Directive became effective andeventually became a requirement of the International Foundation for Environmental Education (FEE), of which FM6Eis a member.
Lastly, following the presentations by the different speakers, participants were able to debate on the key elements for innovative management and approach in terms of redesigning the Awards, rewarding participatory initiativesthat are practical and useful for environmental education, the FM6E’s primary mission.
The recommendations defined at the end of this workshop will be noted and available at the FM6Ewebsite, www.fm6e.org.