Next week, the Mediterranean water agenda moves to Rome, where two major events will take place back-to-back, and PRIMA will be present at both, reinforcing its role as a driving force behind the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems (WEFE) Nexus approach in the region.

28 September: 2nd UfM Ministerial Meeting on Water

Water Ministers from the 43 member states of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) will gather in Rome for the 2nd UfM Ministerial Meeting on Water, nine years after the first such meeting in Malta (April 2017). The meeting will be held at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, and PRIMA has been invited to attend as an Observer.

Ministers will review progress on the UfM Water Agenda, set the direction for regional cooperation through 2030, and adopt a package of documents negotiated over the past year,  including strategic frameworks already endorsed at the 15th Meeting of the UfM Regional Platform on Water (Barcelona, November 2025).

Most significant for PRIMA: Ministers are expected to endorse the Strategy for the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus in the Mediterranean Source-to-Sea Continuum, a strategy developed by the UfM, UNEP/MAP and the European Commission, with technical support from GWP-Med, the EU-funded WES project, and PRIMA.

PRIMA and the Strategy for the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus in the Mediterranean Source-to-Sea Continuum, in brief:

• The Mediterranean WEFE Nexus Strategy in the Source-to-Sea Continuum has been published, with PRIMA at its heart
• The final Strategy was adopted at the Barcelona Convention COP24 (Cairo, December 2025) and at the 15th Meeting of the UfM Regional Platform on Water (Barcelona, November 2025).
• Its strategic objective: moving from “Nexus thinking” to “Nexus doing.”
• It is led by the Union for the Mediterranean and the European Commission, with technical support from GWP-Med, the EU’s WES project, and PRIMA.
• PRIMA has been a pioneer since 2019, having funded 12 dedicated WEFE Nexus projects (€34M). Following the mainstreaming of the Nexus approach across all PRIMA calls in 2024, a further 67 projects integrating the Nexus approach are now entering the PRIMA portfolio, mobilising €114M in research and innovation investment across the region.
• The Strategy and its Action Plan will pave the way for scaling up PRIMA projects, giving completed projects a concrete pathway, through this regional framework, to move from pilot to scale.

29 September – 2 October: Euro-Mediterranean Water Forum

Running directly on from the Ministerial, the Euro-Mediterranean Water Forum will bring together policymakers, international organisations, civil society, researchers and private businesses from EU member states, the Balkans, the Arabian Peninsula and Sub-Saharan Africa, under the theme “Working together to achieve water security in the Mediterranean by 2050.”

The Forum will address the region’s “Water Trilemma”: too little water (scarcity and drought), too much water (floods and extreme weather), and polluted water. It is organised by the Italian One Water Committee, the Institut Méditerranéen de l’Eau (IME), and the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM).

PRIMA’s presence at the Forum

1. PRIMA Side event. 29 September (14h30-16h) “Advancing the Operationalisation of the WEFE Nexus in the Mediterranean”

Date: 29 September 2026. Time: 14:30–16:00. Room: ITACA. Format: Panel discussion. Language: English.

This session will showcase lessons from 8 PRIMA-funded projects: Ecofuture, NexusLabs, MOREFEUS, DIONYSUS, RES-MAB, FrontAg Nexus, CIRQUA, and WEFE4Med.

The discussion will focus on evidence from implementation — what these projects have delivered on the ground, where an integrated WEFE approach made a real difference, what difficulties were encountered, and what conditions are needed for results to be taken up, replicated or adapted elsewhere in the Mediterranean. PRIMA’s monitoring and evaluation already point to a growing body of concrete results and exploitable outcomes; this session goes a step further, capturing the experience behind them — where bringing water, energy, food and ecosystems together actually changed a solution or a decision, which actors had to be involved, and what helped move results closer to uptake.

As the strategy above makes clear, PRIMA’s strength lies in its projects — what is being implemented on the ground, in direct support of the shift from Nexus thinking to Nexus doing.

Project factsheets:

Forum agenda:

30 September (14:30 – 16:00). High-Level WEFE Nexus Engagement (High-Level T5)

Conclusions from the 29 September side event will feed directly into this high-level session, organised by IME. The session explores how policymakers can shift the WEFE Nexus from a theoretical concept into pragmatic, finance-ready strategies, moving beyond a resource-efficiency model toward sustainability governance, and equipping policymakers with actionable tools while avoiding the pitfalls of oversimplification.

LINK: https://www.euromedwaterforum.it/themes-and-programme/programme#wed-30th-sept

30 September (9:30–11:00) — Mediterranean WEFE Nexus Community of Practice

Organised by GWP-Med and the Cyprus Institute, this session puts the spotlight on the Mediterranean WEFE Nexus Community of Practice, developed by the WEFE4MED project. Serving as the project’s concluding event, it will reflect on lessons learned from WEFE Nexus implementation across the region and discuss pathways for scaling impact beyond individual projects and initiatives, again, catalysing the shift from Nexus thinking to Nexus doing.

Rather than treating Water, Energy, Food, and Ecosystems as isolated sectors, this community acts as a shared, real-world platform to develop cross-sectoral policies and deploy scalable resource models across the Mediterranean.

The Mediterranean WEFE Nexus Community of Practice is vital because it breaks down traditional sector boundaries to solve deep climate and institutional crises:

• Bridges Science and Practice: Uses real-world “living laboratories” to test innovations before investing in large-scale rollout.
• Prevents Resource Conflicts: Offers data frameworks to stop actions in one sector from ruining another, ensuring food expansion doesn’t dry out water basins or destroy ecosystems.
• Combats Climate Fragility: Promotes cross-border diplomacy to help EU and non-EU Mediterranean nations build shared defenses against rapid warming and desertification.
• Unlocks Funding: Sets regional guidelines that turn isolated green projects into legally structured, finance-ready policies that attract global investors.

https://wefe4med.eu/wefe/home

30 September, 16:30–18:00 — Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus (T5)

Organised by the One Water Committee Italy (OW), the Mediterranean Water Institute (IME) and the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM).

Global crises, climate change, demographic shifts, conflic, cannot be tackled through siloed, sector-by-sector approaches. The panel traces how Integrated Water Resources Management has evolved into the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystems Nexus, a governance framework built to manage interdependent resource systems together rather than in isolation. This EuroMed Talk revisits the theme through a more technical and vertical lens, in dialogue with practitioners and sector experts.

https://www.euromedwaterforum.it/themes-and-programme/programme#wed-30th-sept

1 October, 14:30–16:00 — Climate Science & Regional Water Action

Convened by EMME-CCI, the Cyprus Institute and the University of Balamand, with IME and the Arab Water Council (Ali Rhouma participating), this session examines the policy, institutional and economic conditions required to scale up treated wastewater reuse, presenting relevant policies, strategies and initiatives.

Across both events, one thread runs through PRIMA’s participation: from strategy to practice. As the region adopts a shared framework for the WEFE Nexus, PRIMA’s portfolio of over 80 Nexus-related projects, and the lessons emerging from them, is what will turn that framework into results on the ground.

KEY MESSAGES:

• PRIMA is a technical key partner behind the Strategy for the WEFE Nexus in the Mediterranean Source-to-Sea Continuum, set to be endorsed by Water Ministers on 28 September.
• PRIMA has been a pioneer of the WEFE Nexus approach since 2019, funding 12 dedicated Nexus projects (€34M) and, since mainstreaming the approach across all calls in 2024, a further 67 projects (€114M) now entering its portfolio.
• The strategic objective PRIMA is driving forward, for itself and the region, is moving from “Nexus thinking” to “Nexus doing.”
• PRIMA’s core contribution is evidence from implementation: at the 29 September side event, 8 PRIMA-funded projects (Ecofuture, NexusLabs, MOREFEUS, DIONYSUS, RES-MAB, FrontAg Nexus, CIRQUA, WEFE4Med) will share what an integrated WEFE approach has actually delivered on the ground.
• The through-line across both events: PRIMA’s strength lies in its projects, turning a shared regional strategy into results that can be replicated and scaled across the Mediterranean.