The CORALLO project trophy was recently presented at the Palace in Attard to HE President George Vella by the Coordinator of the project, Prof. Alan Deidun. The motivation for the award, as reflected within the inscription on the same memento, was the President’s environmental advocacy, which have distinguished the majority of his speeches ever since his maiden speech way back in April 2019. And the trend was not broken at the CORALLO event, with the President delivering a scathing attack on the country’s institutions for failing to safeguard the country’s natural assets and to revise the country’s permissive development permitting system.

Prof. Deidun have an overview of the over-arching goals of the CORALLO project as well as of ongoing efforts within the same project, which aims to deliver a memerising array of mobile and non-mobile assets within prominent sites managed by Heritage Malta so as to inspire the public about the sea, in line with the UN’s Ocean Sciences Decade (2021-2030).

The event was attended by staff from all three Maltese partners on the CORALLO project, namely Prof. Deidun and Mr Johann Galdies on behalf of the University of Malta, Mr Mario Cutajar, Chairperson of Heritage Malta along with Ms, Katya Stroud and Ms. Elaine Debono from the same institution, and Mr Darrin Stevens, Deputy Director at the ERA (Environment Resources Authority), Ms Claire Caruana, Mr Daniel Cilia, Mr Shaun Baron and Ms Joanne Pullicino from the same entity. The International Ocean Institute (IOI), whose Headquarters are hosted at the University of Malta, also presented the President, through Managing Director Ms Antonella Vassallo, a marine-themed memento in commemoration of the IOI’s 50th anniversary this year. IOI Honorary President Dr Awni Behnam delivering an online message through which he exalted the President’s former role as Malta’s Foreign Minister which was defined by concrete action in favour of global ocean governance.