Masks will no longer be mandatory in Monaco from Saturday, with the exception of a few tourist hotspots like Casino Square.
The decision was made “despite the increase in incidence and positivity rates observed over the last 10 days, and to avoid a pause in the gradual reduction in the health restrictions”, according to a statement released by the Palace late Thursday.
From Saturday 19th June, masks are no longer required outdoors in the Principality except at the Place du Palais Princier and the alleys of the old town on The Rock, Place du Casino and the neighbouring areas that form the Carré d’Or, the Esplanade du Centre Commercial de Fontvieille, the Condamine and Monte-Carlo markets during operating hours, the access areas to bus stops and the train station, as well as the surroundings and access areas to schools.
The news comes just over 24 hours after France announced that it would drop the requirement for masks outdoors from Sunday and amid repeated calls from the National Council for Monaco to do the same.
The government has, however, maintained the midnight curfew, despite France’s complete scrapping of the measure.
“The Prince has asked his Government to conduct, as soon as possible, a consultation with representatives of catering professionals in order to define the conditions for a geographical expansion of customer reception. HSH the Prince will assess the health situation next week to define the measures likely to be taken with the dual objective of protecting the health of the population, and to meet the expectations of actors in the economy, especially those related to tourism activities,” said the Palace in its statement.
Vaccinating the majority of the population has always been the aim of the Prince’s government and there are, according to the Palace, enough inoculations to protect 65% of Monegasques and residents over the age of 12.
“HSH Prince Albert II calls on all people who have not yet been vaccinated to take this step in order to regain both personal and collective well-being as quickly as possible,” said the Palace.
Currently, 54% of the eligible population has been vaccinated with at least their first shot.
Photo by Cassandra Tanti for Monaco Life
"Smart Mobility has moved much faster than we anticipated"
Like the Principality of Monaco, Tel Aviv in Israel is a Smart City with an insatiable appetite for sustainable technology.
An important aspect of that is Smart Mobility, and for 10 years, EcoMotion Week has been bringing together entrepreneurs, academics, government officials, local and global automotive industry representatives, and investors for an event that is designed to grow the Israeli Smart Mobility sector.
Following the recent EcoMotion Week in May, Monaco Life spoke to the Co-Founder and Chairman of EcoMotion Week Meir Arnon about Smart Mobility, the surprising rapid advancement of driverless vehicles, and the future of flying cars. Monaco Life:When did EcoMotion Week begin and why?
Meir Arnon: EcoMotion is an NGO that started 10 years ago in order to build an industry in Israel that was not there before – Smart Mobility. There are a lot of technologies coming from the defence industry, but not so much in other industries. So, we wanted to organise a yearly event that brings together thought leaders and actual global car makers. The first event attracted around 200 people; at the recent event, there were close to 5,000 – all carmakers and suppliers. It has become an event that the entire industry supports, and it now includes more than 600 start-ups in the Smart Mobility field. We have achieved what we wanted to in creating a new industry with lots of jobs and profits.
Of course, unfortunately during Covid, the 2020 and 2021 events were virtual, but they were nonetheless very successful with thousands of meetings and agreements between companies and start-ups. EcoMotion Week 2019 Which field of Smart Mobility has excited and surprised you most throughout the decade?
When we started, we thought that the most exciting story we would be able to tell would be semi-autonomous driving, where a driver can relax a little and rely on some of the car sensors. We did not anticipate the speed in which this technology would actually be implemented. Regulation is of course very important, not just the technology, as well as customer acceptance. In the US today, over 70% of passengers are happy to drive in a fully-autonomous car, without a driver. If you were to ask the same question five years ago, it would probably be a third of that. So, one thing we saw coming is the semi-autonomous car, but it developed much faster than we thought.
The other is electrification. Arguably today, there is not one car company that has not committed to moving totally, or mostly, to electrification. Volvo was the first to announce that there would be no more internal combustion engines (ICE) in their cars by 2030, and by 2025, more than half will be electric. GM followed, saying that by 2030 more than half of their cars would be electric, then Ford did the same. If you had asked me five years ago, I would not have thought it would be so quick.
The reason for this speed is partly because, for the past five years, China has been dramatically subsidising electric cars because of the terrible pollution they have in their big cities. This accelerated the rest of the global car players. Meanwhile, five years ago, the battery industry in China was much more developed than that in Europe and the US. It is no longer the case, because many car makers – for example Tesla and many other car companies – have invested billions of dollars locally in battery manufacturing.
Another surprisingly speedy change is something that you or I could have only dreamed about – flying cars. And again, five years ago it was kind of like, “ok, good luck with that”. But today it has become centre stage. There are around 200 companies today with what we call EVTOL – electric, vertical take-off and landing. Of course, they have some challenges, but there are flying cars today that fly in the air and drive on the road. So, it parks in your garage, you fly to a short strip or private airport and you take off, you land somewhere and you continue to drive.
This whole world of electric helicopters and flying cars has moved very quickly, much quicker than most people anticipated. It reminds me of another time in history. If you look back 100 years ago in north America, there were 4,000 cars and 25 million horses. When asked what his customers wanted, Henry Ford was quoted as saying that his customers wanted faster horses. Nearly a century later, here we are with close to a billion cars globally. So, looking ahead, do we see flying cars? I think it will take perhaps 50 years, not 100. We will see less roads and infrastructure, and more autonomous flying cars in air corridors. Flying car at EcoMotion Week 2019 But what about the affordability of Smart Mobility?
By 2025, it will cost the same to produce a mini-cooper electric as a mini-cooper ICE.
Today, electric cars cost about 25% more to produce because they are less in numbers and there are parts that are costly today, but will not be costly tomorrow, such as the electric engine.
Now, let’s look at the reverse. An electric car has less than 1,000 parts. Normal cars today have ten times as many moving parts, and the moving parts are usually the problem. So, the fact is, electrification will eventually reduce the cost of cars.
With regards to autonomous cars, what today would cost you around $100,000 will cost a couple of thousand dollars five years from now.
Flying cars will continue to be expensive, but service in a flying car will be less costly. I don’t think flying cars will be targeted to everyone in the next five to 10 years, but they will come to prices that the average person can use. Not buy, but use for sure, like a taxi. What range are we talking?
Today, flying cars are using normal ICE engines, but they will soon use batteries and become electric. We envision that, if the battery develops, a flying car is looking at short-haul trips of between 160 to 800 kilometres.
Technologies are allowing things that we could not imagine a few years ago. The fact that these flying cars will be autonomous, that’s for sure; and the fact that people are willing to step into an autonomous car or plane is now more accepted than, say, five years ago. It is not just the technology and the cost, but also the acceptance among people that they can rely on a “robot”. What about cybersecurity? How much effort is being directed towards securing Smart Mobility?
There is a huge amount of work in this field. In Israel alone, there are more than 50 start-ups engaged in this field, some of whom were sold to Continental for over $500 million. It has been identified that once this technology becomes real and is no longer in the testing phase, the more security becomes a major issue, just like in normal aviation. How is the aviation industry moving towards electrification?
The limitation today is battery performance. For example, there are currently seven or eight fully electric planes being tested but they have a range of maybe 160 kilometres.
But battery technology has also seen enormous advancement over the past 10 years. Kilowatts per dollar and kilowatts per kilogram have both dropped by a factor of 10 in the last five years, and continue to drop in that trajectory. So, it will get there. The world is working hard on clean energy, especially you guys there in Monaco. What synergies do you see between Monaco and Israel?
I think Smart Mobility is very much linked to Smart City, and here in Israel we are working a lot of with the major principalities. The synergies between Monaco and Israel? Firstly, I would say that we are on the same ocean, so we should both take care of it. Secondly, Israel is full of technologies, Monaco is full of money – the challenge is to put the two together.
One of the world’s top forecasters, Christophe Barraud, has told an audience of Monaco entrepreneurs what he predicts the global economic recovery will look like in 2021.
Voted Forecaster of the Year 2020, Top Forecaster of the Eurozone Economy 2015-2019, Top Forecaster of the US Economy 2012-2020, and Top Forecaster of the Chinese Economy 2017-2020, Christophe Barraud’s presence in Monaco was always destined to be a coup for local businesses and its organiser, the Monaco Economic Board (MEB).
This week’s presentation was the first big “phygital” event of the year for the MEB and Christophe Barraud delivered his macroeconomic scenario for the coming months to a room of 70 local economic players and in front of cameras that broadcast the presentation, translated into English, to nearly 150 participants worldwide. His main forecast: an extremely marked recovery of global activity with growth of more than 6% for the year 2021.
This optimism, which he says can vary depending on the regions of the world, can be explained by four major factors. Firstly, the effectiveness and acceleration of the distribution of vaccines against Covid-19 have created a shock of confidence, and the latest wave of the epidemic appears to be under control in the vast majority of developed economies.
Secondly, the arrival of Joe Biden as President of the United States of America has eased trade tensions, especially with Europe, as highlighted by the truce in the Airbus-Boeing dispute. Above all, he says, the new administration has given better visibility to economic players, now freed from the threat of unpredictable tweets. As a result, Christophe Barraud says he foresees an increase of around 10% in world merchandise trade volume in 2021.
Thirdly, the excess in savings that many households have experienced as a result of the pandemic should contribute to the recovery through increased consumption.
Finally, the economist underlined the ultra-accommodating monetary policy in developed countries and the combined balance sheet of the G7 central banks, which has increased by more than 10 trillion dollars in the space of 15 months between February 2020 and May 2021.
The situation is not without risks, however. Among other threats, the forecaster points to the presence of variants that are likely to change the health situation, and the risk of social unrest, as history has shown that the end of a pandemic has always been accompanied by an increase in inequalities.
Christophe Barraud finished the evening with a question-and-answer session before joining the Monegasque entrepreneurs for a friendly Covid-compatible cocktail, ending a conference that successfully marked the return of face-to-face actions of the MEB.
Coming up on the MEB agenda is the general assembly coupled with the emblematic membership meeting.
Prince Albert has helped to release seven adolescent seahorses into the wild as part of a project to repopulate the quickly dwindling species.
It comes as the first conclusions of a new study about the seahorse population in Monegasque waters carried out by the Prince Albert II Foundation, the Oceanographic Museum and its Monegasque Centre for the Care of Marine Species (CMSEM), the BIOTOPE design office, along with expert in European seahorses Patrick Louisy have been released.
Seahorses are considered to be “near-threatened” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the global authority on the status of the natural world and the measures needed to safeguard it. This status means the natural populations are in decline and could become extinct altogether if nothing is done to rectify the situation.
The study’s aim was to gain information about Monaco’s seahorses and their habitats, to determine the best course of action to protect them and to engage in relevant conservation activities.
Volunteer divers from the Monaco Underwater Exploration Centre spent 160 hours underwater between June and September 2020 in order to acquire as much data as possible. The divers confirmed the presence of seahorses, specifically the Hippocampus guttulatus commonly known as the speckled seahorse, but were able to observe only three of the species in the wild.
The speckled seahorse, which is named for the white dots that cover their bodies, live in seagrass beds or coralligenous, of which there are many ideal spots for breeding in the waters off the Principality.
A pregnant male was captured, and the resulting babies were temporarily reared in captivity to ensure their viability. Prior to their sea release, seven of the juvenile seahorses were tested for genetic diversity. This was to ensure they wouldn’t disrupt an already fragile recipient population. The findings were interesting in that the Monegasque variety had different genetic characteristics than other seahorses in the Mediterranean.
The young speckled seahorses, which will reach 12cm to 16cm when fully grown, were released on 16th June in the late morning at Saint Nicolas rocks and the Fontvieille dike in roughly 20 metres of water with the help of Prince Albert.
These juveniles and the existing population will now be monitored for five years via a photo-identification protocol, allowing animals to be identified from their individual natural markings. The photos will serve as a visual, with complementary observations such as passive acoustics and environmental DNA being used.
Passive acoustics is a sound process that makes it possible to monitor the attendance of a site by a given species. Environmental DNA makes it possible to study the presence of a species thanks to the DNA it leaves in its environment. These tools will make it possible to track their seasonal movements and better understand their habitats.
Photos by E. Mathon – Palais Princier, P. Fitte – Musée Océanographique, and M. Dagnino – Musée Océanographique
Monaco Poste has released a quartet of new stamps to celebrate the 10th wedding anniversary of Prince Albert II to Princess Charlene, including an adorable one featuring the twins.
Four new stamps are now in circulation in the Principality marking a decade of marriage for the Prince and Princess.
The first stamp features the couple on their wedding day with a beaming Prince Albert next to his stunning bride. Another is a photo of the Prince and Princess waving from a balcony of the Palace. The third is a graphic stamp that features the first initials of the couple nestled next to each other with 2011-2021 across the bottom.
In the final one, six-year-old twins, Prince Jacques and Princess Gabriella, try their best to sit still as their bemused parents smile for the camera. The effect is both intimate and charming, showing a casual warmth between the members of the family.
The complete set of the commemorative stamps cost 6.00€.
Office des Timbres – Principauté de Monaco
The stamps are a wonderful complement to the one that came out in April featuring the entire Princely family in an official photo. This more formal shot of the family shows the Prince and his son in matching blue suits and ties, with Gabriella in a sweet pink frock with a gingham check overcoat. The Princess is a showstopper, wearing a long white Grecian gown with a beautiful and unique collar around her neck.
Both sets of stamps can be purchased from the Monaco Office des Timbres.
Office des Timbres – Principauté de Monaco
Prince Albert II wed Charlene (née Wittstock) in a civil ceremony in the Throne Room of the Princely Palace on 1st July 2011. This was followed up the next day with a religious ceremony that took place in the Palace courtyard and was presided over by then Archbishop Bernard Barsi.
The couple welcomed their children into the world on 10th December 2014, where upon Hereditary Prince Jacques became the next heir to the throne.
After a year in which Monaco was largely denied its rich cultural events due to Covid, a full calendar has been announced for the 2021 Department of Cultural Affairs summer programme.
On Wednesday at the Princess Grace Theatre, Director of Cultural Affairs Françoise Gamerdinger presented the Department of Cultural Affairs summer programme to the press.
On the roster are the 51st edition of the Théâtre du Fort Antoine, which will run from 29th June to 6th August, as well as the 15th edition of the Monaco International Organ Festival, which goes from 27th to 15th August. In total, there will be 14 evenings and seven events at the Catherdral, including a cine-concert.
Fort Antoine will host its much-loved theatre programme that will see performances, events and talks by the Printemps des Arts, the NMNM, the Prince Pierre of Monaco Foundation, the Audio-visual Institute of Monaco, the Philosophical Meetings of Monaco, the Princess Grace Theatre and the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra.
These diverse performers will offer a variety of entertainment options including screenings, concerts, conferences and a special evening tribute to Jean-René Palacio, who recently passed away but helped create this programme along with the Société des Bains de Mer de Monaco (SBM).
Monaco International Organ Festival Artistic DirectorOlivier Vernet revealed the theme of this year’s event to be ‘Organ sharing’ and will present the latest recordings made on the Monaco Cathedral’s organ, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. A special concert will be held to mark this event.
In honour of the anniversary and in collaboration with the Médiathèque de Monaco, a book signing with Claude Passet and Silvano Rodi, authors of the Grand Livre de Organ à Monaco, will be organised at the Louis Notari Library.
