Conference “Potentials and Challenges for Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland – and for the European Union”

Brussels, 11 March 2014 -The extensive functional, institutional and regulatory integration with the EU made it natural for Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland to join ESPON as Partner States. They are included in the territorial analyses on challenges and opportunities for Europe’s territorial development and their support to ESPON has also enabled researchers from these countries to participate in ESPON projects, exchanging know-how on relevant territorial development issues with colleagues from other European countries.

The ESPON Conference will present and discuss territorial evidence, seen from a European perspective, related to the four Partner States. A roundtable discussion, which will be moderated by a representative of the Greek EU Presidency, will allow high-level representatives from Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Switzerland, Member States and the EU to discuss and exchange on common initiatives for growth and territorial cohesion.

The event is jointly organized by ESPON, the Ministry of Industries and Innovation (Iceland), the Ministry of Environmental Affairs - Land Use Planning - Agriculture and Forestry (Liechtenstein), the Ministry of Local Government and Modernisation (Norway) and the Federal Office for Spatial Development ARE (Switzerland) and takes place at the Mission of Switzerland to the EU.

Registration is open until 28 February 2014 at 14h00. More details, programme and registrations here.

ESPON Calls for Tenders

(1) “ESPON Update of Maps (2011-2014) – Update of Maps and Related Data on Climate Change”

Main objective of this Call for Tenders is to carry out a service contract for updating the following indicators: (1) climate change exposure of Europe’s regions, (2) climate change sensitivity and aggregated potential impact of climate change on Europe’s regions and (3) adaptive capacity and vulnerability of European regions to climate change of the ESPON Climate project.

Deadline for requesting the documentation is 11/03/2014 at 17h00.

(2) “ESPON Update of Maps (2011-2014) – Filling in Data Gaps in the ESPON Database”

Main objective of this Call for Tender is to carry out a service contract for collecting count data and metadata, building up time series and filling in data gaps in the ESPON Database on (1) population, (2) employment by age group and gender and (3) employment by economic sector.

Deadline for requesting the documentation is 20/02/2014 at 17h00.

ESPON Work Plan 2014

Four strategic avenues will guide the implementation of the ESPON 2013 Programme in 2014:

(1) Emphasising capitalisation and communication activities and wide-spread use of ESPON territorial evidence based on all results achieved with the ESPON 2013 Programme, with particular promotion of new evidence becoming available during 2014.

(2) Improving the ESPON toolbox through a wide-range of actions on different issues that together contributes to a consistent and inter-related set of tools for territorial analyses based on ESPON results.

(3) Guaranteeing high quality, solid and useful outputs from active projects, supported by clear executive summaries and applications that can make ESPON even more useful as provider of territorial evidence and tools.

(4) Continuing efforts ensuring sound financial management with finding-free audits and quality checks and preparing for the winding up of the 2013 Programme.

The ESPON Work Plan 2014 is available at the ESPON Website.

Latest Reports from Projects - Growth poles

Draft Final Report of GROSEE - Growth Poles in South-East Europe

News from INTERREG IVC - EU public consultation on INTERREG EUROPE

A public consultation on the draft interregional cooperation programme 2014-2020, called ‘INTERREG EUROPE’, is running until 21 March 2014. All interested individuals and organisations are encouraged to complete the online questionnaire to provide their feedback on the draft cooperation programme. More details at http://www.interreg4c.eu/interreg-europe/public-consultation/