Transcript Regionalism as a Source of Development within the

Regionalism as a Source of
Development within the European
Union
Dr. Olesea SÎRBU,
Director,
CSEI.ASEM - Centre for Studies in European Integration
Academy of Economic Studies of Moldova
Europeanisation
vs.
Regionalisation
 27 Member states
 493 million inhabitants
 271 regions
Why is regional policy important ?
 The second most important of EU
policies regarding financial
support
 Cohesion of the territory: to
reduce economic and social
disparities
 Solidarity: assisting the lessadvantaged regions (among them
border regions)
 Smart, sustainable and inclusive
growth (EU Strategy 2020)
 partners instead of competitors
 solidarity for the benefit of all
 dysfunctions caused by borders and remote location
can be eliminated
 building synergies in a wider European space
 think global, act local (common endeavours to find
local solutions for global challenges)
 diversity is an asset, not a barrier
 win-win situation
 Cohesion of the territory is one is guiding principles of
the EU
 Regions have considerable competencies in decision
making and in executive powers
 Representation body:
Committee of Regions
Preamble of the Treaty of Rome (1957): “reducing the
differences existing among the various regions and the
backwardness of the less-favoured regions”
 Period 1957 – 1988: The Origins
o European Social Fund (ESF), 1958
o European Agricultural and Guarantee Fund (EAGGF), 1962
o European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), 1975
o Single European Act – 1986
 Period 1988 – 1993: From projects to programming
o June 1988 – first integrated regulation for Regional policy
o Allocation: ECUS 64 billion
o Methodology: multi-annual planning, strategic orientation,
involvement of local and regional partners
 Period 1994 – 1999: Consolidation and doubling the
efforts
o Cohesion Fund (established by TEU, Maastricht, 1992)
o Introduced principle of subsidiarity
o Allocation ECUS 168 billion, 1/3 of EU budget
 Period 2000 – 2006: Preparing for enlargements
o The Lisbon Strategy shifted the EU's priorities towards
growth, jobs and innovation
o Pre-accession instrument ISPA (€ 7 billion)
o Allocation for member states: €213 billion
o Additional allocation for new members 2004-06: €22
billion
 Period 2006 – 2013: Focus on new priorities
o Allocation €347 billion
o 81,5 % for the poorest regions
o ¼ of resources for research and innovation
o 1/3 for environment
 Level NUTS 1: number of inhabitants between 3 and
7 million
 Level NUTS 2: number of
inhabitants between
800.000 and 3 million;
 Level NUTS 3: number of
inhabitants between 150.000
and 800.000
Decentralisation of management
 EU Level: Community Strategic Guidelines
 National Level: National Strategic Reference
Framework for each member state
 Regional Level: Operational Programme for each
region
 among founding Member States: southern parts of Italy
 1973: Ireland, parts of Great Britain
 1981: Greece
 1986: Portugal, Spain
 1995: rarely populated northern territories of Sweden
and Finland
 average GDP per capita in EU-27 reduced by almost 12 %
compared to EU-15
 EU realises 43% of its economic income in only 14 % of its
territory
 Luxembourg is the richest EU state and has a GDP 7 times
higher than Romania, the poorest EU state
 lowest GDP per capita: region of Nord-East Romania - 23% of
EU average
 highest GDP per capita: Inner London region – 290% of EU
average
(Eurostat data)
Regional disparities
in development
in EU27
GDP per head in % and
in purchasing power parities
EU27 average in 2007
<50
50 - 75
75 - 90
90 - 100
100 - 125
 125
 Allocation: € 347,7 billion - 35,6% of total EU budget
 Estimation of the impact: contribution to growth in
new member states in the average for 6% and creation
of 2 million new jobs
EU budget 2007-13, structure
 Knowledge and innovation: € 83 billion (24% of
budget)
 Environmental protection and risks prevention: € 51
billion (19% of budget)
 Human resources: € 76 billion (22% of budget)
 Other interventions: € 61 billion (17% of the budget)
o entrepreneurship, energy networks and efficiency, urban
and rural regeneration, tourism, culture and
strengthening the institutional capacity of public
administrations
 Criterion for distribution of funds:
• GDP of regions
• Structure of economy and index of economic growth
• Unemployment rate and structure of employment etc.
 Regions are divided into groups with the same
development „objective“
 Calculation method laid down by EU regulations
 Funding allocated to a member state can not
exceed 4% of GDP of that MS
2007 – 13: 3 objectives
 European Regional Development Fund (ERFD)
 European Social Fund (ESF)
 Cohesion Fund (Members states with GDP/pc below
90% of EU average)
Objectives
Structural Funds and instruments
Convergence
ERDF
ESF
Regional Competitiveness
and Employment
ERDF
ESF
European territorial
Cooperation
ERDF
infrastructure,
innovation,
investments
etc.
vocational
training,
employment
aids etc.
all Member States and regions
Cohesion
Fund
environmental and
transport infrastructure,
renewable energy
MemberStates with a
GNI/head below 90%
Objective 1: CONVERGENCE
 to promote growth enhancing conditions and factors in less
developed regions, leading to development of least-developed
areas
 Eligible for funding are regions, whose per capita GDP is less
than 75% of the EU average
 Number of eligible regions: 100 in 17 MS
• Number of inhabitants: around
170 million (out of 493)
• Various projects:
infrastructure, support to
SMEs, innovation, investments
etc
Objective 2: REGIONAL COMPETITIVENESS AND
EMPLOYMENT
 strengthening competitiveness and attractiveness
 creating new and prosperous employment opportunities
 Eligible regions, which show structural imbalances in
economy and employment. Included so-called “phasing-out”
regions
 Number of eligible regions: 168
 Number of inhabitants: around 314 million (out of 493) in 19
member states
 Possible projects: innovation, knowledge society, protection
of environment, improvement of accessibility, new and better
jobs, investments in human resources
Objective 3: EUROPEAN TERRITORIAL COOPERATION
 Eligible are all EU regions + Switzerland, Norway, Iceland
 promoting cooperation across the EU territory
 supports projects which combine efforts of at least two, but of
course also more regions
 STRAND A: Cross-border cooperation
 Border regions
 52 programmes
 Cca. 70 % of budget; i.e. 5,4 billion €
 STRAND B: Transnational cooperation
 Large international regions (North Sea, Baltic Sea, Alpine space,
South-East Europe etc.)
 13 programmes
 Cca.: 25% of budget; i.e. 1,8 billion €
 STRAND C: Interregional cooperation
 Known as Interreg C, Interact, Urban, ESPON
 Covers all EU, Norway and Switzerland
 Cca.: 5% of budget; i.e. 445 million €
European Territorial cooperation
2007-2013
Allocation: €7.75 bn.
for cross-border,
transnational and
interregional cooperation
Cross-border areas
 essentially about "filling the gaps and eliminating
the effect of borders”
o - Encouraging entrepreneurship, especially the
o
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development of SMEs, tourism, culture and cross-border
trade
- Improving joint management of natural resources
- Supporting links between urban and rural areas
- Improving access to transport and communication
networks
- Developing joint use of infrastructure;
- Administrative, employment and equal
opportunities work
 adds an important extra European dimension to
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regional development
Cooperation of several EU Member States
Innovation, especially networks of universities, research
institutions, SMEs;
Environment, especially water resources, rivers, lakes, sea;
Accessibility, including telecommunications, and in
particular the completion of networks;
Sustainable urban development, especially polycentric
development
 pan-European level, covering all EU-27 Member States +
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Norway, Switzerland
networks to develop good practice and facilitate the
exchange and transfer of experience by successful regions
INTERREG IV C: 1.) innovation and the knowledge
economy, and 2.) environment and risk prevention
URBACT II: actors at local and regional level exchange
experience and to facilitate learning on urban policy
themes
"European Spatial Planning Observation Network" (ESPON)
provides scientific information
INTERACT II programme provides training, services and
tools to programme managers and administrators of cooperation programmes
Regional Policy for Macro-regions
1.
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
“Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region”, June 2009
“Strategy for the Danube Region”, April 2011
 To raise the »Euroregions concept« to a higher level
 EC legal instrument introduced in 2006 (Regulation EC No
1082/2006)
 EGTS – introduces possibility to establish legal entity in CBC (sell,
buy products, employ persons etc.)
 Bodies from at least two member states; members from outside
EU are potentially possible as well
 Members can be any level of government: regional, local, or
association or any other public body
Activities of EGTC:
 To implement European territorial co-operation programmes or
projects
 To implement other territorial co-operation actions co-financed by
EU
 To carry out other activities that are not linked to EU funding
 Third Protocol to the Framework Convention
 Opened for ratifications in November 2009
 It states: EGTCs are, in principle, restricted to EU member states
(only a very loose statement in the preambule)
 Complies with provisions of EGTCs
 Offers a better balance between the general principles and the
detailed rules so as to provide a maximum flexibility and, at the
same time, more legal certainty to both, EU and CoE member states
Main advantage:
 Make the cooperation of non-EU countries in such transnational
cooperation groupings more clear and feasible
Good management of EU funds presupposes the
existence of the following basic elements:
 Effective local democracy
 Effective institutional capacity (adequate structures to
deal with regional policy at local and regional
authorities, regional development agencies, adequate
expert institutions for preparation of plans,
applications and reports)
 Effective local development actors (SMEs, NGOs,
research institutions, educational institutions,
cultural, sport organisations, other social entities)
1. Impact on the economy:
 Rapidly increasing income in the poorest regions:
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita in the EU's
least developed regions (the so-called Objective 1
regions) grew from 66% of the EU-25 average in 2000 to
71% in 2006.
 Creating additional jobs: an estimated an estimated
1.4 million jobs were created, around 1 million of which
in enterprise.
2. Impact on transport infrastructure:
 Modernizing transport links: Cohesion policy
funded 4700 km of motorways and 1200 km of high
speed rail. This means that 77% of motorways in the
Cohesion Countries (GDP below 90% of average), and
some 56% of high speed rail were co-financed by
cohesion policy.
 As a result, average motorway density in Spain, Greece,
Ireland and Portugal went from 90% of the EU15
average in 2000 to 111% in 2006
3. Impact on enterprise:
 Supporting business development : 230,000 SMEs
received financial support (mainly grants but also loans
and venture capital) and a further 1.1 million received
advice and support for networking, leading to an
estimated 1,000,000 jobs created at the EU level
4.
Impact on research:
 Investing in research and innovation : Nearly
38,000 research and development projects received
support with the creation of over 13,000 new long term
research jobs
5.
Impact on the environment
 Improving the environment: Cohesion Policy made
an important contribution to help regions comply with
EU environmental standards. For example, 20 million
more people have been connected to modern
water supply systems, 23 million more people have
waste water treatment
Europe 2020 Strategy
• smart
• sustainable
• inclusive growth
 Employment
 75% of the 20-64 year-olds to be employed
 R&D / innovation
 3% of the EU's GDP (public and private combined) to be invested in
R&D/innovation
 Climate change / energy
 greenhouse gas emissions 20% (or even 30%, if the conditions are
right) lower than 1990
 20% of energy from renewables
 20% increase in energy efficiency
 Education
 Reducing school drop-out rates below 10%
 at least 40% of 30-34–year-olds completing third level education
 Poverty / social exclusion
 at least 20 million fewer people in or at risk of poverty and social
exclusion