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Day: 29 January 2021

Prince's Foundation helps spearhead Coral Reef Fund

by: Cassandra Tanti
29/01/2021

The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation has joined Germany and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation in contributing more than €10 million to the Global Coral Reef Fund, kickstarting an unprecedented campaign to finance the preservation and restoration of coral reefs.
The contributions were announced at the first Global Coral Reef Fund (GFCR) Board meeting this week and mark the launch of a fundraising campaign that will culminate at COP26 in Glasgow in November 2021.
Coral reefs, which support approximately one billion people worldwide, are among the most threatened ecosystems on the planet. It is estimated that more than half of the world’s coral reefs have disappeared due to climate change, overfishing and increasing local pressures. The decline of coral reefs can, however, be reversed by acting urgently to implement proven, large-scale projects.
“Coral reefs are one of the habitats most threatened by climate change. They make an important contribution to the biodiversity of our planet and to the protection of coasts,” said Dr Gerd Müller, German Federal Minister of Economic Cooperation and Development. “The establishment of the Global Fund for Coral Reefs is an important step towards the protection of these ecosystems.”
The GFCR is a blended finance mechanism that will use public and philanthropic funds to catalyse private investments in coral reef conservation and restoration. These initial contributions will be used to make the fund operational, develop a pipeline of eligible projects and implement the first promising projects. The GFCR Board of Directors reviewed and provided initial guidance on programming priorities at its inaugural meeting which ended on 28th January.
Initiated during a workshop organised in 2018 by the Principality of Monaco and the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation, the GFCR has since become a global partnership that includes Member States (Germany), philanthropic organisations (Paul G. Allen Family Foundation and the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation), United Nations agencies (UNDP, UNEP and UNCDF) and financial institutions (BNP Paribas and Mirova).
“We are pleased to join this world-class public-private partnership to change the trajectory of the coral reef crisis,” said Paul Keating, director of philanthropy at Vulcan Inc. on behalf of the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. “This smart blended finance approach enables governments, philanthropy and private investors to work together to achieve a common goal: the sustainable conservation of coral reefs.”
Administered by the United Nations Multi-Partner Trust Fund Office, the GFCR is the first United Nations trust fund specifically dedicated to Sustainable Development Goal 14: Life Under Water, and the world’s first blended finance instrument dedicated to coral reefs. The fund responds to the “coral reef funding gap” and the fragmentation of funding for coral reef conservation and restoration projects.
“Home to 25% of the marine life and essential for a billion people in the world, the protection of coral reefs is vital to the survival of the planet,” said Olivier Wenden, Vice-President and Managing Director of the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation. “These ecosystems are facing unprecedented threats and significant loss. Without urgent action and rapid mobilisation of financial resources, coral reefs will experience even greater collapse.”
The GFCR is expected to mobilise US $125 million in grants and US $375 million in financing assets, which together will unlock more than US $2 billion in investments in coral reefs. The fund will demonstrate how a blended finance approach can mobilise resources to support communities dependent on coral reefs.
“Innovative financing for conservation is a central pillar of UNDP’s strategy,” said Haoliang Xu, UN Assistant Secretary-General and UNDP Director of Bureau for Policy and Programme Support. “Without nature, at least half of the SDG’s goals cannot be achieved and half of the world’s GDP depends on nature. As the United Nations’ first multi-partner trust fund for SDG14, the Global Coral Reef Fund will unlock private sector funding for conservation while helping countries rebuild and improve resilience to Covid-19 and other shocks.”
 
 
(Monaco Life with Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation press release)
Photo by LI FEI on Unsplash

New director for Princess Grace Irish Library

by: Stephanie Horsman
29/01/2021

Paula Farquharson-Blengino has been named the new director of the Princess Grace Irish Library, taking over the reins from Judith Gantley who has held the post for 25 years.
It’s a changing of the guards at Monaco’s Princess Grace Irish Library. After a quarter of a century at the helm, Judith Gantley is stepping aside as director. In her place will be Irish-born Paula Farquharson-Blengino who has made a career in the fields of marketing, communication, journalism and events.
Ms Farquharson-Blengino says her passion for Ireland and its culture and literature inspired her to take the post at the library.
“This role felt like a perfect fit for me. All the experience that I’ve gained during my varied career can be leveraged to add value at the library,” Ms Farquharson-Blengino told Monaco Life. “And after years in the corporate world working in marketing and communications, I wanted to work in the non-profit sector; the library is under the aegis of the Princess Grace Foundation, which does such good work helping sick children and assisting young people embark on training for careers in the cultural domains such as literature, music and dance. This is a way to put my corporate experience to work for the good of others. And I have the bonus of a vast choice of books at my fingertips and for my two young sons too.”
The new director says she is looking to the future and will bring a fresh approach to the running of the facility whilst still maintaining time-honoured tradition.
“We will continue with the twice-yearly bursaries for writers, and we have a symposium planned with academics from Villanova University close to Philadelphia (Princess Grace’s hometown). We also want to develop collaboration with the schools in Monaco,” said Ms Farquharson-Blengino. “I also hope to have more film producers/script writers visit and give talks and workshops – given Princess Grace’s acting career it seems a natural step. In February we’ve planned an online conversation with Irish film director Mary McGuckian about her newly released film ‘A girl from Mogadishu’. Mary also produced the film ‘The Price of Desire’ about Eileen Gray, who designed and built the E-1027 villa at Roquebrune-Cap-Martin.”
The Princess Grace Irish Library offers visitors a chance to peruse the private collections of books and music collected by the late princess. Additionally, the library gives patrons the opportunity to borrow novels written in English, many from Irish authors, as well as offering a vast selection of historically valuable reference materials.
Over the past 25 years, Judith Gantley has been charged with looking after the facility’s 12,000-strong book collection, as well as the paintings, objet d’art, photographs and music collection.
She has used her vast contacts to attract top-shelf personalities to the library to speak on a broad range of topics and has organised seminars once every two years, inviting experts in Irish literature and culture to speak to academics and others interested in the subject.
Paula Farquharson-Blengino is taking over at a difficult time when the health situation constrains her ability to organise most events, although some have been held virtually over the past months and she says she is looking forward to a hybrid offering with both live and online events going forward.
“This is a time of transition for the library,” said the new director. “The health crisis is forcing us to review how things have always been done and adapt – we will go online with events and even when normal life resumes, the digital world will allow us to be more creative and reach more people, beyond the cosy, intimate setting of the physical library.”
Ms Farquharson-Blengino says her short-term goal is to keep the door of the Princess Grace Irish Library open for “young and old to receive an Irish céad míle fáilte (a thousand welcomes).”
 
Photo of Paula Farquharson-Blengino by Ed Wright Images
 
 

New 'extreme' zone proposed for travel guidelines

by: Stephanie Horsman
29/01/2021

The European Commission has set out new plans to prevent the internal border closures of last spring, including a dark red label for areas where Covid is circulating at extreme levels.
In a press release on 25th January, the European Commission said that it had proposed an update to the agreed colour coding for mapping out high-risk areas, as well as stricter measures applying to travellers coming from these high-risk zones. There is also a strong recommendation to avoid travel at all whenever possible.
“The agreement in October on an EU coordinated approach for travel restrictions was a big step forward in our efforts to curb the spread of Covid-19 while preserving essential travel and the functioning of the Single Market,” said Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders. “The common map and a common approach to proportionate, non-discriminatory restrictions must still guide our efforts. What we need now in view of the new variants is even more coordination and a joint European effort to discourage non-essential travel. Border closures will not help, common measures will.”
Colour coding will essentially be the same as before with zones being marked as green, orange, red and grey, but now they will add a dark red to indicate areas where the virus is circulating at extreme levels. This would apply in places where the two-week notification rate is over 500 per 100,000 people. The European Centre for Disease Prevention will publish updated maps regularly.
For people travelling from dark red zones, EU member states are being asked to require them to undergo Covid testing pre-arrival and to self-isolate as recommended by the Health Security Committee of the EC.
Monaco’s incidence rate remains “very high” with 400 positive cases per 100,000 people over a seven-day period, the government announced on 26th January as it moved to extend by three weeks the current restrictions.
 
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Curfew to remain amid Covid resurgence

 
Photo source: Unsplash
 
 

France: Silver lining amid massive GDP plunge

by: Stephanie Horsman
29/01/2021

France suffered the worst economic recession since WWII in 2020, far surpassing the 2.2% contraction of 2009 due to the financial crisis. Still, reveals INSEE, activity held up better than expected during the second lockdown.

Latest figures show that France’s economy saw a drop of 8.3% in gross domestic product (GDP) in 2020, a huge decline but not as steep as the one forecasted by the government and the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE).

The government outlook saw a pessimistic 11% plunge, whilst INSEE fell closer to the mark at 9%. This disappointing showing comes on the heels of a marked growth of 1.5% in 2019.

The French economy was saved a worse outcome due in part to managing better in the second confinement in autumn than expected, though the fourth quarter dip of 1.3% was an unexpected drop.

This is thought to have been because of a fall in household spending in the usually robust pre-holiday period, even though spending in December rebounded quite strongly after a dismal November. The December lift can be attributed to the reopening of shops as well as the postponement of Black Friday leading to a 23% rise in spending after more than a 18% plunge in November.  

During the autumn confinement, activity losses were “much more moderate than that observed during the first confinement of March-May 2020,” and in the last quarter, the GDP “was 5% lower than its level a year earlier,” said INSEE. Consumption again dropped by 5.4% over the period, due to the closure of shops, after a rebound of 18.2% in the previous quarter. On the contrary, investment continued to recover, up 2.4%.

France exported more than it imported for the second quarter in a row, with 4.8% in exports versus 1.3% for imports, showing that foreign trade contributed positively in the last quarters.

The government’s attempts to curtail the spread of the coronavirus by imposing strict lockdown measure resulted in a drop of 7.1% in household consumption across the board, whilst investment fell by 9.8% and exports by 16.7%. Imports fell by 11.6%, showing the extremity of the disruptions caused by the crisis.