Presentation Glasgow 8 November EUSBSR example

Transcription

1 Presentation Glasgow 8 November EUSBSR example Thank you, It is very inspiring for me to be here, coming from one Sea Basin to another. I believe we have many things to learn from each other, and coming from a very much more confined and smaller Sea Basin it is a bit humbling to come and share our experiences with the larger Atlantic region. Nevertheless, I ve been asked to share some experiences and results from the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, which was the first of Macro Regional Strategies to be launched in the EU. I have also been asked to say something about our experience from our efforts to align funding of the EUSBSR, which I will do later. First of all I need to put the EUSBSR in a little bit of perspective. The EUSBSR was launched in 2008, a few years after the enlargement of the EU with Poland and the Baltic States. The Baltic Sea went from being a dividing sea to a unifying sea, 1

2 serving its historical Hanseatic role as trade route and common denominator. Making the Baltic Sea a Mare Nostrum of the European Union. There was a sense that we needed to benefit from the fact that 8 out of 9 Baltic Sea Countries now were EU-members and that the EU membership could help in addressing common challenges. All the 8 Member States got together and identified some of the key challenges that were translated to three main objectives: Save the Sea, Connect the Region and Increase Prosperity. Having a common Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region has helped mobilise projects across borders and sectors and it serves as a catalyst for strengthening cooperation mechanisms among EU Member States in the Region. * * * The first objective, Save the Sea, comes from the fact that the Baltic is a semi-enclosed body of water, with a water exchange of an average of years, which means that what you put in the water will stay there for years. The pressure on the ecosystem is immense. With heavy nutrient overloads, algae growth has suffocated as much as square km s of 2

3 the sea bed, roughly the size of Denmark. The sense of urgency is quite clear and much of our work is directed towards this challenge. With the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region, we have been able to dedicate a number of flagship projects with the purpose to reduce nutrient leakage. Improving waste-water treatment from both ships and land, improving farming practices to mention a few. Luckily, figures are improving. Harmful loads of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus are decreasing with 18 and 23 percent respectively. These are the main sources of eutrophication of the Baltic Sea and this goes to show that efforts do pay off. I m not saying that the EUSBSR can take credit for all of this, but it is certainly contributing with many trans-baltic projects and we can even claim that the EU has been inspired to introduce a ban on phosphates in detergents, thanks to the EUSBSR. * * * 3

4 The second objective is to Connect the region. After the enlargement in 2004, there was a need to improve the connections with the new EU- member states. Links are now continuously being improved and shipping activity has increased. Some 90 percent of trade within the region is being transported by ship. At least ships are sailing the Baltic Sea at any given moment. This is a welcome development - shipping is generally speaking an environmentally friendly and safe mode of transport, but the consequences of an accident in this semi-enclosed sea can easily be disastrous for a very long time. The EUSBSR has provided with a whole range of projects to improve shipping routes and e-navigation so that today, all EU maritime authorities are providing with data for a seamless surveillance and monitoring of shipping routes. This has drastically reduced risks induced by the human factor. This example is from the shipping sector, but connectivity is a much broader term, it has to do about connecting people * * * The third objective, increasing prosperity, is obviously a very generic objective and often criticized as such. I will not argue 4

5 this but there is no lack of activity in this field and many activities are related to a Baltic Sea Regional dimension of the Europe 2020 agenda, based on the notion that competitiveness can be increased by transnational and transregional clustering of economic activity. This has been particularly clear in the area of innovation. This leads me to an example on the second experience that I was asked to share, that of alignment of EU-funding. One of the key aspects of the EUSBSR is to promote and support projects which address one of the three main objectives: Saving the Sea, Connecting the Region and Increasing Prosperity. The focus of our attention is on projects and actions that are transnational and transregional in character and thus needs a cooperation between regions, Member States, authorities and more recently also programming authorities. Up to date, more than 100 EUSBSR-flagship projects have been implemented and more are continuously being added to our Action Plan. Funding of these projects is diverse, the EU interreg programmes play an important role but funding also 5

6 derive from other EU, national or regional programs such asthe European Structural and Investments Funds, EIB, Horizon 2020 and sometimes also from Nordic and national funding. Sweden has assisted in a large share of projects with the help of small but strategically important seed-funding for prestudies and start-up activities, also enabling involvement of neighbouring countries that are non EU Members such as Russia and Belarus. When we first started with the EUSBSR in 2009, there was much talk about alignment of funding, particularly from the EU Structural and Investment Funds. Billions of Euros each year were dedicated to this region surely some of these funds should be available to implement the EUSBSR? After all, the Commission was saying, all 8 Member States in the region had agreed to the strategy and its action plan. True, but easier said than done. The Strategy was, after all, adopted in the middle of a programming period and the Regulation had not anticipated this option and combining different regions or Member 6

7 States project funds was very challenging with very different national legislation, priorities and management systems. Entering into a project with partners from other Member States or even other regions within the same country, is often a very risky affair. Applications will take different amount of time, priorities will differ, routines will simply be very different and will risk delaying joint projects. The present funds allow for an increased use of funds outside the programming area and thus allowing for activities for the benefit of an extended region, such as the Baltic Sea Region. Today, we have a number of pilot projects using this opportunity. They are from the European Social Funds, European Regional Development Funds, Rural Development Funds as well as the Fisheries Funds. The most advanced model has been elaborated by the ESF, European Social Funds, which have worked out common calls for a few dedicated areas for EUSBSR relevant projects. The other funds are primarily focusing on the possibility of linking projects and project partners with similar objectives in areas of common interest. By doing so they can plan and adjust their projects to also include co-operation elements. 7

8 A good and current example is a project promoted by the Baltic Sea Regional network of Management Authorities of the European Regional Development Funds (ERDF) for Structural funds programmes. They have launched a pilot project called Cleaner Growth with presently two joint project proposals which are confined in scope: 1. Jointly entering new challenging markets in Clean-tech 2. Commercializing forest- based protein (feasibility studies and testing) The project collaboration is based on a true regional demand, supported by regional innovation planners and developed by their innovation actors from no less than 13 different regions. The MA-network is committed to align activities and resources from various funding sources mainly mainstream ERDF structural funds to initiate a pioneering type of transnational collaboration. This is all just a small glimpse from our work in the Baltic Sea Region, it is good learning from other regions and particularly 8

9 experiences from sea-basin areas, which is why I am particularly glad to attend this conference today. Thank you for listening 9