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From year to year, the local governments are putting more effort to implement the regional development strategies in Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia. Indeed, such actions are more than justified, t he regional policy is one of the essential points of the Association Agreements with these countries. In the boundaries of EU Regions week, the high-level representatives meet together to compare their experience in transition from a centralized planning system, and to discuss their progress on Smart...

Articles focusing on the EU and Cohesion Policy were very positive even in Britain during the Brexit vote, an analysis covering multiple news outlets from 2010 to 2017 has found. Views on the EU and Cohesion Policy were overwhelmingly positive from 2010 to 2017, finds a recent monitoring analysis covering over 20 news outlets and 4400 newspieces. Newspapers such as The Guardian, El Mundo, Wales Online and Bloomsberg all had an overall-positive outlook on the EU. The tone of the media coverage is...

„Stop Brussels”. That is one of the most known political messages of the current Hungarian government. It could be heard on the radio, seen on the television, and read all around the country on billboards. The main political force in Budapest wants to show that the country is independent, and the Hungarian leaders don’t need anyone to tell them what to do. In the meantime, Hungary is very well dependent on the European cohesion policy. And the government needs these EU funds too: the continuous...

Most regional and local represeters who were attending the “Cities and Regions Role in European Making Policiy” conference today thought that citizens and regional authorities’ knowledge about the impact of EU policies in their territory is highly poor. That’s why iniciatives like LUISA exist. This morning the dutch researcher Sjoerdje Van-Heerden, in the context of the EU Regions and Cities Week, has presented the project LUISA for territorial impact assessment and policy evaluation. The...

„Czechia became richer and so the responsibilities are bigger, “commented Joseph Schwarz, from DG Regio, on the new cohesion policy framework for the programming period of 2021-2027. During the current period Czechia´s economy has grown strongly as in 2018 the GDP expanded by 3 percent according to data from the European Commission. European Union´s cohesion policy aims to help weaker economies and less developed regions among the EU member states by various funds. Czechia got in current...

The EU goal of a smarter Europe is restricted by the regional disparities that exist in Adult Education opportunities, as outlined in the policy paper "Mind the Gap: Education Inequality across EU Regions". Some EU regions report 30% of their citizens aged 16-65 are involved in formal adult education, whereas other regions report figures as low as 3%. This disparity requires a strategic approach for the regions and local authorities to formulate policies and programmes that align with national...

Following the Paris Agreement, the EU has committed to reducing annual greenhouse gas emissions by 40% over 1990 levels by the year 2030, and by at least 80% by 2050. Cutting back coal-fired power generation is an important element in this context, and this will have tangible economic and social effects on Europe's coal-producing regions. Lignite and coal are currently mined in 41 NUTS-2 regions, and there are coal-fired power stations in 103 NUTS-2 regions. The structural change initiated by...

The policymakers came together on Wednesday 9 October for the “ Education and Training Institutions bringing research and innovation closer to citizens and communities” session held within the EU regions Week. They discussed what can be done to make the educational institutions closer to the citizens. T he discussions centred on Skills and Smart Specialization Policy Report, human capital, different forms of mobility and place-based curriculum. Speaking to participants at the session, John...

What you just read is true: everyone in Europe wants to be like this small-southern Italian city. Pride of Place is an innovative initiative that wants to spread the Matera miracle to other places in Europe. Two years ago, The Guardian published an article titled: The miracle of Matera: from city of poverty and squalor to hip hub for cave-dwellers. But what happened in Matera isn’t just a miracle… This city suffered from a problem that lots of countries in Europe (and around the world) are...

A debate about “The adaptive re-use of our built heritage for a greener Europe” was led on Wednesday morning, in the bossom of the European Regions Week. Too often people attention is focused on big world-wide issues forgetting that a change must be made first in our daily places. Cristine Clotet Ollé, architect for the Government of Catalonia, Eugen Panescu, member of the Architects' Council of Europe, Antonia Gravagnuolo, researcher at IRISS, Valerio Barberis, Deputy Mayor of Urban planning...