MER Consortium

The University of Southampton, the University of Bordeaux, the University of Liège and the University of the Basque Country, with the collaboration by the Founding Research Associates, AZTI-Tecnalia and the Oceanographic Foundation of Gipuzkoa constitute the MER Consortium. In academic year 2006-2007, an integrated Joint MSc Programme of high quality named “European MSc in Marine Environment and Resources” was started. Recognition and funding was provided by National programmes (Top Master in Basque Government ranking 2007-2011; the Spanish Education Ministry Quality Award 2007-2012; the Spanish Education Ministry Mention to Excellence 2011-2014), the Cooperative French-Spanish MSc support programme (Ministries of Foreign Affairs), and the Mediterranean Office for Youth (MOY) label 2012. These actions covered research and education initiatives, but also administrative staff exchanges. In 2012, the prestigious MUNDUS label was awarded (Erasmus Mundus Master Course on Marine environment and Resources; EMMC MER)and since then collaboration and networking within the European hugher edcuation Area has been projected at global scale. The extended MER consortium includes additional 16 associated partners from all over the world, including research institutions, companies and universities.

A fundamental strength of the programme is that all Partners share a common research interest but each one possesses its own expertise with some synergic overlaps. Collaboration involving staff members from the different Partners has been on-going on for many years, in research, teaching and international exchanges. Such complementarities provide the student with a complete overall perspective of the marine environment and resources, with the invaluable opportunity to follow specialisation with outstanding marine scientists of diverse expertise.