Open Seminar “ESPON Evidence for Regional Policy-Making” - Contributing to the Europe 2020 Strategy

8 June 2010 - Roundtable discussion with key policy makers on the Europe 2020 Strategy
A special roundtable discussion with key policy makers on the Europe 2020 Strategy will take place in the morning of the first day. This session will focus on understanding the contribution of the diversity of European territories to a smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.

The aim of this session is to target the mindset of the participants and the seminar discussions on new ESPON findings and evidence to potential contributions of different territories, and by doing so to support the further development of EU Cohesion Policy and in particular its territorial cohesion component.

Parallel Workshops
Based on the first session, detailed discussions in parallel workshops will address the results of the ESPON Applied Research Projects and Targeted Analyses in relation to the policy questions underlying them. The challenge of these workshops is on the one hand to show experiences for communicating and disseminating project results to regional stakeholders and on the other hand to address specific means to communicate these results.

The audience will also be informed about key messages the final ESPON projects have delivered to regional policy makers and stakeholders. This first day will end with a runway of new ESPON projects and selected expressions of interest that will lead in to ESPON projects during 2010.

9 June 2010 – How to use ESPON evidence in policy-making
The morning of the second day is devoted to show the use of ESPON evidence in policy-making through a number of examples. The session will start with an example at the EU level and stepwise zoom in to the local level.

Hereafter the parallel workshops will continue, now also including workshops with the ESPON Database. Finally, the Seminar will close up by giving insights on the further development of the ESPON 2013 Programme, including on data, indicators and typologies related to European Territorial Cohesion.