Once again, for the 22nd time precisely, the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Regional and Local Policies (DG Regio) and the Committee of the Regions (CoR) have joined their forces to host and organise in Brussels the "Eu Week of Regions and Cities 2024", a one-of-a-kind event about EU cohesion policy mainly thanks to its extension and participation from all over the space of the Union.
Therefore, from the 7th to the 10th of October 2024, four days of high-level sessions, workshops and participatory labs were held in various locations, both at the offices of the institutions and at the permanent representations of the regions in Brussels. Exhibitions and tastings of traditional food products from the regional territories from all regions of Europe were also a another big part of the event, involving like this every aspect of local realities: from policy making activities to culinary culture.
The Interreg Program VI-A Italy-Slovenia and the Interreg Program Italy-Croatia have organised, combining their forces for the first time in years of experience of the Interreg programmes, a presentation and a participatory workshop on Wednesday 9 October at the premises of the permanent representation of the FVG Region in Brussels. The excellent attendance and the absolute satisfaction of those who attended the meeting, both as political figures, as Managing Authority, and as representatives of the different projects implemented in the Programs, confirmed the radical importance of promoting regional cohesion programmes and cross-border policies.
CROssingITA-SLOwly, the result of the innovative collaboration between programmes to foster synergies with the Interreg Italy-Croatia Programme, draws on a first pilot project of synergistic collaboration from 2023: MovingITA-SLOwly, the successful joint experience of developing three strategic projects (Kras-Carso II, POSEIDONE, ADRIONCYCLETOUR) under the Interreg VI-A Italy-Slovenia Program.
At the premises of the permanent representation of Friuli Venezia Giulia Region took place, after the institutional greetings, a participatory lab dividing the participants into three cluster groups for better sharing the experiences of projects implementation and to further implement mutual listening with the ultimate goal of creating new synergies in the field of sustainable tourism. The attention of each working group was dedicated to three different fields: Sustainable mobility, cultural heritage and natural heritage.
The Finance Councillor of the FVG Region, Barbara Zilli, while opening the meeting and presenting the workshop activities , stated that: "What we have put in place is an absolute novelty at the level of Community programming that aims to better connect and implement networking activities among territories in order also to share, within the framework of Interreg, projects already in place and strongly focused to develop plans for sustainable cross-border tourism worth over 20 million euro. In this case, in fact, the action of Italy - with the Regions of Friuli-Venezia Giulia and Veneto - and Slovenia would also be extended to Croatia giving territorial continuity to the Adriatic coastline”.
The focus of the innovative collaboration born this year, as explained by the Councillor for Finance of the FVG Region, is based on improving sustainable tourism involving cross-border projects that already have as their main objectives sustainable mobility, natural and cultural heritage. This participatory workshop, which is currently emerging as a unique collaboration between several Interreg programmes, is aligned with the Theme 3 of this year’s EURegionsWeek: Smart and sustainable growth for regions.
Within this framework and representing the European Commission as Director of the Directorate-General "DG Regio", Dr. Slawomir Tokarski brought his greetings to the public and spoke with enthusiasm, repeatedly stressing the peculiar factor that distinguishes the synergy between Italy, Slovenia and Croatia. Dr. Roberto Ciambetti, President of the Regional Council of Veneto Region, then brought his own greetings, highlighting the success of the implemented initiatives.
The participants were also welcomed by the Interreg Program VI-A Italy-Slovenia’s Management Authority, Laura Comelli, and Eugenia Vianello, staff of the Managing Authority for Interreg Italy-Croatia Program.
"During the positive experience of these last years of European planning, many important objectives were achieved, consolidating the idea that collaboration with our neighbouring territories is strategic. In this perspective and within this framework, the desire to, once again, go beyond boundaries and borders, with a particular reference to Croatia, represents an unmissable opportunity for a further enhancement and overall promotion of our territory". This was the final part of the speech delivered by Councillor Zilli, who then let the participatoy lab begin with its activities. As already mentioned, the participants were divided in three round tables clustered by the projects’ main themes. The participating members were from North-Eastern Italy, from western Regions of Slovenia and from the coastal regions of Croatia. Collaborations, implementation of knowledge, exchange of ideas among programmes and projects were the protagonists of the workshop, leading to tangible results and achievements even made on that very same day.
PPT presentations of the #CROssingITA-SLOwly participatory lab:
PPT of the synergies between Kras-Carso II and AGROTUR+ projects
PPT of the synergies between ADRIONCYCLETOUR, POSEIDONE and Kras-Carso IIn projects
