Procedure

The concerned parties prepare and provide to the SPA/RAC a presentation report following the template adopted in 2001 by the contracting Parties to the Barcelona Convention, including information on the geographical location of the area, its physical and ecological characteristics, its legal status, its management plan and its implementation means, with a justification of the Mediterranean importance of the area.

Article 9 of the SPA/DB Protocol provides that the proposed listing shall be submitted: (i) by the party concerned, if the area is situated in a zone already delimited, over which it exercises jurisdiction; (ii) by two or more neighboring parties concerned if the area is situated, partially or wholly, on the high sea; and (iii) by the neighboring concerned parties for areas where the limits of national jurisdiction are not defined yet.

After official transmission to the SPA/RAC of the presentation report, the proposal is submitted to the focal Points for ASP, to examine its compliance with the provisions of the SPA/BD Protocol and with the common criteria for the selection of marine protected areas that may be included in the list of SPAMI (Annex I to the SPA/DB Protocol).

If the proposal is deemed compliant by the SPA focal Points, the SPA/RAC will forward the proposal to the meeting of the contracting Parties which decides to include the area on the SPAMI list. For an area wholly or partly on the high seas or for areas where the limits of sovereignty or national jurisdiction are not yet defined, the decision to include the area on the SPAMI list must be taken, by consensus, by the contracting Parties which also approve the management measures applicable to the area.

Finally, contracting Parties may revise the list following the "Procedure for the Revision of Areas on the SPAMI List", adopted in 2008. The aim of this procedure is to assess whether the sites on the SPAMI list still meet or not the criteria defined in Annex I of the SPA/DB Protocol.