Prof. Momoko Kitada
World Maritime University, Malmö, Sweden
The World Maritime University (WMU), which was established within the framework of the International Maritime Organization (IMO), has been offering a space for international participants from policy makers, industry, academia, NGOs and general public to discuss the role of gender equality to transform the maritime and ocean community to be more inclusive, fair and equal. In May 2025, WMU hosted its fourth conference focusing on gender equality at its premise in Malmo, Sweden. With only five years left before the timeline for the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, WMU attempted a different approach to organize this conference by increasing stakeholder engagement and collaboration through partnerships.
One of such successful partnerships in this conference was a collaboration with the BlueRights—the EU COST Action CA23103—Life, Liberty, and Health: Ensuring Universal Protection of Human Rights at Sea. This partnership brought mutual benefits to both the COST Action group, BlueRights, and local organizer, WMU. As a local organizer, I would like to share some key success areas for this partnership.
1. Active participation in the session of human rights and wellbeing: BlueRights brought a keynote speaker for this session and four participants who actively participated in the relevant workshop on the same topic. It helped shape new agendas for human rights and wellbeing at sea.
2. Knowledge sharing through case studies in the Book of Abstracts: BlueRights members contributed to send a case study about human rights and wellbeing at sea, which were marked as a tangible outcome of the BlueRights activities.
3. Scientific reviews in the abstract selection: In total, seven scientific reviewers were voluntarily provided by BlueRights. Thank you! Their names were acknowledged in the Foreword of the Book of Abstracts.
4. Increased visibility of BlueRights through funding support to a local organizer: The COST Action approved the BlueRights to support the WMU’s conference with some funding. As a result, the BlueRights logo with EU Cost Action logo was added to the programme, podium sign, Book of Abstracts, conference website and other promotional materials.
I as a local organizer have a very positive experience working with BlueRights and recommend that other conference/workshop organizers consider this partnership opportunity. Finally, I thank the BlueRights members who provided exceptional support to the conference, including Chairs Prof. Anna Petrig and Prof. Irini Papanicolopulu. Those funded participants shared their experience of participating in the conference through blog articles and thank you all for your contributions!
The conference website is accessible from this link:
A Book of Abstracts can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1VYUmCBrF1pcC0WtpK2NrCEPJImqdKocP/view
A conference news on the WMU website: https://www.wmu.se/news/advancing-the-blue-economy-through-gender-equality
This blog is based upon work of COST Action CA23103 – Life, Liberty and Health: Ensuring Universal Protection of Human Rights at Sea (BlueRights), supported by COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology).