Review of activities 2016

Tasks
The purpose of the ESPON EGTC is to act as single beneficiary to implement and deliver the content envisaged by the ESPON 2020 cooperation programme. The ESPON 2020 cooperation programme is designed to support the reinforcement of the effectiveness of EU Cohesion Policy and other sectorial policies and programmes under European Structural Investment (ESI) funds as well as national and regional territorial development policies, through the production, dissemination and promotion of territorial evidence.
The EGTC is the single beneficiary responsible for implementing the ESPON 2020 cooperation programme that is set in the framework of cohesion policy and is one of the territorial cooperation programmes under the interregional strand. The objective of the programme is to promote the effectiveness of EU cohesion policy and other sector policies and programmes under ESIF as well as national and regional territorial development policies, through the production, dissemination and promotion of territorial evidence covering the entire territory of the 28 EU Members States, as well as the four Partner States of Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. The purpose is to contribute to a cohesion policy that has the maximum effect in supporting the Europe 2020 strategy, strengthening the capacity of the EU economy to grow, innovate and generate employment, and to deliver a positive and lasting impact in promoting territorial cohesion and harmonious development across EU regions and Member States. Support to national and regional authorities in contributing to the Europe 2020 strategy and to territorial cohesion is an inherent part of the programme.

The ESPON 2020 Cooperation Programme is an ETC programme and therefore, the EGTC as the single beneficiary, is directly involved in implementing one of the ETC programmes under the interregional strand. The role of the EGTC in supporting other ETC programmes is related to providing relevant evidence that programmes might use for their monitoring and evaluation proposes, for defining the thematic priorities of calls for proposals, developing future orientations post 2020. During 2016, the EGTC commenced a range of research activities in the following thematic fields: inner peripheries, low-carbon economy, possible territorial futures, SMEs, FDI flows, spatial planning and governance systems, employment dynamics.

In 2016, the EGTC launched a survey aiming ESIF programmes to assess their needs for territorial evidence support. It is planned during 2017 to launch a new project for targeted evidence support aimed at 19 ESIF programmes, including ETC programmes. The objective of the project will be to provide tailored evidence support or programme territories and for benchmarking their programme areas in its larger European territorial context including detailed analysis, maps, territorial indicators and datasets. This will include practical workshops with stakeholders to identify key challenges and potentials in a European context and which in turn can support the setting of public investment priorities accompanied by tangible targets.

The EGTC produces macro-regional monitoring tools. One tool for the Baltic Sea Region (BSR - TeMO) has been successfully produced so far and this will be further developed with other new monitoring tools and its launch is planned in 2017.

Budget
€ 12,736,494.20

EU-funded projects and programmes in phase of imple-mentation in 2016
Single beneficiary of the ESPON 2020 cooperation programme

Staff (in FTE): 18