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Autumn plenaries : message from the Election Committee

22 August, 2018 By Editor

During the 2018 Autumn Plenaries in Vojvodina, elections will be held. With views to the preparation of these elections, the Election Committee wishes to inform AER members about open positions.

The AER Election Committee

The Election Committee actively informs and encourages members to apply for positions within AER. It inventories and prepares for the elections at both the General Assembly and the Committees.

Its members are :

Chair : Brian Greenslade, Devon (UK)

Monica Gundahl, Värmland (SE)

Gloria Vitaly, Oppland (NO)

Natalija Martincevic, Varazdin (HR)

Message regarding the elections at the Autumn plenaries

Looking forward to seeing colleagues in Novi Sad where there will be elections for the following positions.

Committee 1

Chair of the Working Group on Transport currently Martin Tollén

Chair of the Working Group on Investment, Business and SME’s currently Jean-Luc Vanraes.

Chair of the Task Force on Cohesion Policy currently Michiel Rijsberman.

Vice-President for Economic Development and Mobility

More information about Committee 1 Presidium members and ongoing mandates

Committee 2

Representative for the Equal Opportunities Group, 1 female, vacant

Vice President for Inclusion & Social entrepreneurship, vacant

More information about Committee 2 Presidium members and ongoing mandates

Committee 3

Chair of the Sub Committee on Youth currently Marta Vilalta.

More information about Committee 3 Presidium and ongoing mandates

During our meeting in Novi Sad I will hold a meeting of the Elections Committee to start planning for the large batch of elections next year. Will contact Election Committee members separately about timing for this.

I will be making a short presentation about upcoming elections during our meeting in Novi Sad.

All best.

Brian Greenslade

by Brian Greenslade, Chair of the Election Committee

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Committees develop their 2018-2019 work programme

2 April, 2018 By Johanna Pacevicius

On the occasion of the Committees’ plenaries in Arad, AER members identified the topics which matter most for them and on which they want to develop joint ations on with fellow regions. The developement of the Action Plan was a collective process to enable all participants to specify needs and decide to initiate activities which add value for their region. The principle is the following: as long as an action fits with the AER values, is in line with the AER priorities and has support from other regions, it can be included in the Committees work programmes.

Committee for Economy & Regional Policy

The main upcoming actions in the AER Committee on Economy and Regional Policy can be summed up as following:

Innovation & SMEs :

-sharing experiences & mutual learning on mainstreaming innovation in all public services
-youth entrepreneurship in link with Committee 3
-Event on the Share Economy led by Brussels Capital & Catalonia

Rural development

-waste management in rural areas
-import & export of local agricultural products
-local food systems/ short supply chains
-potential study visit to Norrbotten (to be linked with the TAIEX EIR peer learning opportunity of the European Commission)

Energy

-follow-up on the visit on the energy transition in Gelderland: preparing peer learning via the TAIEX-EIR tool
-international event on biomass in Vojvodina
-use the Sustainable Development Goals to communicate about AER activities
-event on using the Sustainable Development Goals as regional development framework

Transport and Mobility

-experience sharing on the deployment of electric mobility
-REFIT H2020 project on New Mobility Services
-experience sharing & advocacy in the framework of the European Innovation Partnership on Sustainable Cities and Communities on New Mobility Services and exchanges with AER members

Cohesion Policy

-follow-up activities

Committee for Social Policy & Public Health

The main upcoming actions in Committee 2 can be summed up as following:

Social inclusion

-exchange experiences on unaccompanied migrant children
-AMID project on migrants with disabilities
-exchange experiences on social entrepreneurship & social canteen
-highlight frontrunners to increase visibility& inspire

E-health & health innovation

-leadership programme for policy makers on e-health, integrated care systems and health innovation
-risks of digital exclusion
-business models
-data protection, profiling & mass surveillance
-Artificial intelligence, bots

Equal access to health

-vulnerable groups: meet them where they are & help them
– exchange good practices on reducing barriers to care & access to services

Committee for Culture, Education & Youth

The main upcoming actions in Committee 3 can be summed up as following:

Youth

-Erasmus+ project
-promote youth mobility for all across wider Europe via the Eurodyssey programme & ensure all AER members are aware of the opportunities the programme offers
– training on youth mobility for civil servants in the framework of the European College of Cluny

Education

-workshop on entrepreneurship education best practices
-digitalisation in education
-sexual& relationship education
-LGBTIQ rights & sexual identity in education systems

Youth mental health

-organise a webinar on youth mental health
-workshop for mutual learning & experience exchange
-youth mental health as a topic for an upcoming Summer Academy
-awareness activities on the importance of youth mental health
-data collection on youth mental health & impacts/ costs of ill mental health
-sharing of resources for prevention

Culture

-2018 Summer Academy on cultural heritage for regional attractiveness
-Virtual reality: creation of an informal network of regions with a focus on immersion and visualisation of world heritage and cultural heritage
-walking and hiking paths along cultural routes

AER Action Plan

The AER Action Plan brings together all the activities carried out within and via the AER network, be they large or small. The Action Plan aims to be constantly updated. It is the Executive Board, which approves actions to be added to the AER Action Plan, in order to ensure alignment with values and priorities.

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AER in Arad, Romania for Spring Committee Plenaries

19 March, 2018 By Editor

The AER Spring Committee Plenaries took place from 20 to 22 March 2018 in Arad, Romania.

Below you will find a recap of the event, with updates, presentations, and take aways from the conference.

Day 1 (20 March)

The Committees’ plenaries: it’s all about sharing & learning

The day started with, on one side, the AER Executive Board meeting, and on the other, a Study Visit of the city of Arad..

Following this we moved on to the AER joint-committee plenary meeting. Members were welcomed by the President of Arad County Council, Iustin Cionca, and Magnus Berntsson, AER President.

AER’s member relations coodinator, Elin Berglie, then presented the AER presentation to members, which explains what AER is, how it works, and how it presents a great added value for its member regions. (This presentation is available here)

Shinebright

Following a presentation of AER’s achievements by Secretary General Mathieu Mori, AER’s Committee Presidents presented awards to AER member regions that have contributed a lot to the AER network in the last months.

Committee 3 interim President Aleksandra Djankovic, presented an award to Trentino (IT) as a way to say welcome to the Eurodyssey Programme, their active participation will surely prove an asset to our youth mobility network.
Committee 2 President Mihai Ritivoiu, presented an award to Varazdin (HR) for their great engagement in our project unit and for their participation in the SEED project during 2017 Regions Week in Brussels.
Committee 1 President Jean-Luc Vanraes presented an award to Korca (AL) for their dedicated work as part of AER’s Monitoring and Evaluation Group, that strives to improve AER’s output and work.

Political Priorities

Brian Greenslade, Honorary Vice-President of AER, presented the outputs from the Autumn Bureau Meeting in November 2017. You can find a recap of these outputs here. These outputs translate to AER’s political priorities for the 2018-2019 period.

AER Programmes

We got updates on the AER programmes from our members. Esther Estany (Catalonia, ES), President of Eurodyssey, updated members on the changes happening within Eurodyssey, encouraging them to attend the upcoming Eurodyssey Event in april.

Dancus Ioan Doru, Vice President of Maramures county, presented a little more information about the upcoming Summer Academy in his home region in August.

Gloria Vitaly (Nordland, NO) offered a summary of the outcomes from the recent YRN plenaries in Nordland.

Autumn Committee Plenaries

Damir Zobenica (Vojvodina, RS) – talked about the great ideas being thought about for the upcoming Autumn Committee Plenaries and encouraged members to bring more ideas to the discussion! Regional Business Forum is the theme that has been suggested.

Innovation Ecosystems

Multilevel and Open Innovation Ecosystems discussed during Spring Committee Plenaries

Day 2 (21 March)

Committee 3 plenary

Mathieu Mori led the elections for open positions in Committee 3. Congratulations to our new Committee 3 Presidium members!

Radimir Čačić, Varazdin (HR) was elected as President Committee 3.
Simon Johnsen, Nordland (NO) was elected as Chair of the Sub-Committee on Education and Training

Actions were then set in across four discussion groups: Youth, Education, Culture and Youth Mental Health. The actions will be published soon.

Committee 1 plenary

Jean-Luc Vanraes (Brussels-Capital, BE), President of Committee 1, led the elections for open positions in Committee 1. Congratulations to our new Committee 1 Presidium members!

Håkon Noren, Oppland (NO) was elected to the Equal Opportunities Group.
Katarina Tolgfors, Örebro (SE) was elected to the Equal Opportunities Group.
Olimpia Neagoe, Dolj (RO) was elected as Chair of the working group on Rural Development.
Eva Hallström, Värmland (SE) was elected as Chair of the working group on Energy and Climate Change.

Sanja Šifliš (Vojvodina, RS) presented the upcoming event on Biomass in Vojvodina, find out more here.

Martin Tollén (Östergötland, SE) presented the progress being made in the Transport and Mobility working group.

Jean-Luc Vanraes presented the outcomes of the Artificial Intelligence debate that took place in November 2017. Find out more here.

Actions were then set in across four discussion groups: Transport and Mobility, Cohesion, SMEs and Innovation, Energy and Climate Change and Rural Development. The actions will be published soon.

E-health workshop

After a welcome by Agneta Granström (Norrbotten, SE), Chair of the AER E-health Network (presentation here), Sandra Evans, from the University of Tübingen presented the Mach 5 project (presentation here).

Diane Whitehouse, from EHTEL, talked about the deployment of integrated care systems (presentation here). Diane engaged with members from Värmland (SE), Trento (IT) and Prahova (RO) who presented the status of integrated care in their regions.

AER explores E-Health, Transport & Inclusion during workshops at Spring Committee Plenaries

Committee 2 plenary

Mihai Ritivoiu (Timis, RO), President of Committee 2, welcomed members to the committee 2 plenary, and gave a presentation on the Committee’s achievements since the last plenaries in Nancy.

The AER secretariat gave a presentation on the successful projects that have been joined in the field of social inclusion and health. As well as point out the efforts made in advocating for inclusive growth. (See previous presentation)

Committee President Ritivoiu then opened the floor for elections. The two vacant positions remain open:

One female representative for the Equal Opportunities Group
Vice President for Inclusion & Social entrepreneurship

Actions were then set in across four discussion groups: Inclusion, Health Innovation, and Equal Access to Health. The actions will be published soon.

Working Group on Transport and Mobility

Martin Tollén (Region Östergötland, SE) moderated this discussion on transport and mobility in European regions.

Sergiu Bilcea, Vice President of the Arad County Council (RO), gave a presentation on a regional example of a transport and mobility project happening in Arad County. (Presentation available here)

Vivian Stribos (EU Lobbyist Eastern Netherlands, Gelderland Brussels Office, NL) then presented a project on the Rhine-Alpine Corridor. (Presentation available here)

Martin Tollén presented the EIP on smart cities & communities, with input from Rutger Schuitemaker (Flevoland, NL) and Diane Whitehouse (EHTEL)

Roger Esteferos (Senior Expert, SE), elaborated on the state aid issue. (Presentation available here)

You can find more information here.

Evening Lounge Meeting on Equal Opportunities

Equal Opportunity Group Member Kenneth Johannesson (Värmland, SE), standing in for Vice-President for Equal Opportunities Andrew Gibson (Hampshire, UK) led an informal political discussion on how relevant this AER group’s work is.

He offered several examples of the effects and the statistics linked to lack of Equal Opportunity. (Violence against women – Health Inequalities – Local level example)

Members then tackled the following questions:

To what extent is there still a gender pay gap?
What are the factors determining equality of health across regions?
How can we work towards equal opportunities in our regions?

AER’s Equal Opportunities Group: inspiring work for regions

Day 3 (22 March)

Breakfast debate:Democracy in practice

AER, a tool to further democracy in Europe

Workshop on inclusion

We were fortunate enough to be welcomed by Mrs. Erika Stark, General manager of the General Direction/Division for Social Assistance and Child Protection from Arad County Council. She led the conversation on inclusion (See presentation here)

You can find more information here.

AER Committee 2 President Mihai Ritivoiu looks back on the Plenaries in Arad

Extras…

Contributing the work programmes

Are you joining us in Arad? Read how you can participate in the defining of the work programmes here.

Event page

Visit the event page here.

Contact:

Communications & Events

Erica Lee

Tel: +32 2 400 10 85
E-mail: e.lee(at)aer.eu
Languages: en, de, nl, fr, ga, pl,

Communications
Event Management
Partnerships

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Applications for elections in AER Committees

14 March, 2018 By Editor

The AER Election Committee have been gathering and pre-screening applications for open positions within the Committees. The members of the Election Committee are: Brian Greenslade, Devon (UK) (Chair), Gloria Vitaly, Oppland (NO), Johan Edstav, Uppsala (SE)

The elections will take place at the AER Spring Committee Plenaries in Arad on the 21st of March. Each Committee will elect the Chairs of the Working Groups or Subcommittees, as well as the 2 representatives for Equal Opportunities. Committee 3 will also elect their President. The election of the Committee President will be confirmed by the AER General Assembly in Oppland.

Applications approved by the Election Committee

The list of approved applications can be found below:

Committee 1 for Economy & Regional development

Vice-President for Economic Development and Mobility: Radimir Čačić, Varazdin (HR) (View CV here)
One female and one male representative for the Equal Opportunities Group: No application received
Chair of the working group on Energy and Climate Change: Eva Hallström, Värmland (SE) (View CV here)
Chair of the working group on Rural Development: No application received

Committee 2 for Social policy & Public health

One female representative for the Equal Opportunities Group: No application received
Vice President for Inclusion & Social entrepreneurship: No application received

Committee 3 for Culture, Education & Youth

President (the current holder, Dag Rønning, Hedmark (NO) has stepped down): Radimir Čačić, Varazdin (CR) (View CV here)
Chair of the Sub-Committee on Education and Training: Simon Johnsen, Nordland (NO) (View CV here)

That’s not all…

Applications are still welcome, so please do not hesitate to contact Kurt-Åke Hammarstedt, Seconded Officer to the Election Committee.

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The essential guide to contributing to the work programmes

1 March, 2018 By Johanna Pacevicius

Spring is work programme definition season at AER! On the occasion of the Spring Plenary meetings in Arad, members of the three thematic Committees will decide what they would like to do together and how they will leverage regional initiatives via the network. The below elements will help you make the most of this opportunity.

Rule nº1: everything is possible

The main idea is the following: if you want to carry out something within the network, just do it! Any idea is welcome!

To have it included in the work programme, members should:

Share their idea in the relevant Committee plenary meeting. This will be done in workshop style (see below). Members should explain what they would like to do and how they would like to implement their action.
Explain how other regions will benefit: visibility? contacts? new collaborations? benefits for other regional stakeholders…
Explicit what support they would need from other regions: speakers? Ideas? Partners for a project? Contacts to a specific stakeholder? Support for an advocacy action? Advice…
Agree with other members on upcoming steps and be specific!

Rule nº2: everything is possible

The topics addressed in the three AER Committees are the following topics:

Economy and regional development
Social policy and public health
Culture, education and youth

Because these topics are rather broad, many policy areas can be addressed within the different Committees. The topics which have been addressed recently give an idea of what is possible but shouldn’t be considered as a limit. As long as an action fits with the AER values, is in line with the AER priorities and has support from other regions, it can be included in the Committees work programmes.

Committee 1 works on issues covering innovation, economic development and SMEs, Cohesion Policy, transport and mobility, renewable energies and rural development. For the past year, there has been a strong focus on supporting the collaboration of regional innovation stakeholders. Members in partiular discussed the implications of the rise of artificial intelligence, on regional policy making. Long term investments and green investments are also high on the Committee 1 agenda as illustrated by the collaboration with the R20.

Committee 2 is supporting members in implementing e-Health services and exploring the potential of integrated care. It aims at building leadership on change management and innovation in the public sector. Active ageing is a major topic, especially for cooperation at EU level. Inclusion is also a key topics. Committee 2 members have started to collaborate with Committee 3 on the topic on youth mental health, exploring the possibilities for project development and sharing good practice.

Committee 3 focuses on culture, education and youth policies. The Committee has been particularly active in the fight against school drop-out. This resulted in the implementation of an ERASMUS+ interregional project to share good practices and improve regional policies for youth inclusion and empowerment and the publication of a handbook with good practices. Committee 3 furthermore shared regional good practices in the field of culture for inclusion and cultural heritage.

How this will be done

As with the London Spring Plenaries, Participants will be seated around round tables, where each table will work around one topic (or set of related topics). They will share their own ideas & develop jointly actions on the different topics the Committees are working on.

The 3 plenary meetings will be held separately and consecutively so that members are able to participate in all meetings, allowing for synergies & cooperation between Committees.

Members of the AER Youth Regional Network, the Summer Academy and the Eurodyssey programmes are invited to join the process as well so that they can provide ideas on how their work could integrate and feed the work of the committees.

At the end of the session the different actions will be brought together on a flip-chart and organised according to the 3 main categories:

Advocacy/ Lobbying
Projects
Good practice exchange

This document will then be adopted as the Committee’s action plan.

How to prepare?

In order to get involved AER members can

identify the needs they have in their region which could be addressed via the AER network
liaise with their colleagues from other regional departments to identify needs
define an activity they would like to carry out in the Committees
think about how other members could contribute and benefit from this activity
Join the AER Committees online community in order to already share and test ideas with other members
think how they can support other members who have suggested joint actions

What is a Committee?

The AER Committees are the backbone of the network’s activity. They are the place where knowledge and experience exchange happen and where new collaborations are shaped. To this end Committee members meet at least twice a year on the occasion of their Spring and Autumn plenaries. Workshops are organised along with the statutory meetings in order to dig deeper in specific topics and identify areas for policy innovation. Through experience sharing, including both good and bad practices, AER members engage in mutual learning. Whenever a need arises for focused cooperation on a topic, specific projects are set-up, to ensure the experience exchange will be sustainable and co-funded.

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Call for nominations: AER General Assembly and Committees 2018

26 January, 2018 By Editor

Per AER Statute and Procedures, the AER Election Committee will inventory and prepare for the elections at the General Assembly and the Committees. The time-table is as follows:

AER Spring Committe Plenaries, 20 March 2018

Call for nominations: 23 January 2018
Candidate’s applications: The Election Committee will accept applicants until 23 February 2018
Candidate’s portfolios distributed: 6 March 2018

AER General Assembly, 22 May 2018

Call for nominations: 27 March 2018
Candidate’s applications: 10 April 2018
Candidate’s portfolios distributed: 8 May 2018

The AER secretariat will not be in a position to answer questions relating to the election process. All applications and questions relating to the elections should be addressed to:
Kurt Ake Hammarstedt, +46 70 527 83 50

Elections at the General Assembly

The Election Committee will nominate candidates for the elections at the General Assembly by listing all nominees from the AER Members and nominate one candidate for each position. If necessary, the Election Committee may nominate candidates of its own.

The Executive Board

The members of the Executive Board have a term of two years. The current members were elected in 2017, so the positions are up for elections at the General Assembly 2019.

The Bureau

The Bureau consists of the members of the Executive Board and two representatives per State represented within the AER. They have a term of two years and may be re-elected for a second consecutive mandate. Upon proposal by the Regions within a State, they can serve a third consecutive term.

The members of the Bureau and their substitutes are suggested by the Regions of the different states represented in AER and ratified by the General Assembly. The AER Election Committee will present the nominations at the General Assembly, without further processing.

The Monitoring and Evaluation Group

The members of the Monitoring and Evaluation Group have a term of three years. The current members were elected in 2016, so the positions are up for elections at the General Assembly 2019.

The Election Committee

The members of the Election Committee have a mandate for one year, so the positions are up for elections at the General Assembly 2018. The current members are:

Brian Greenslade, Devon (UK) (Chair)
Gloria Vitaly, Oppland (NO)
Johan Edstav, Uppsala (SE)

Each member of the Election Committee must be nominated by an AER member and hold a regional political mandate, in accordance with AER Statute 1.8.

Elections at the Committees

Per AER Statute 9.3, the Committees may prepare, decide and implement initiatives in the framework of their assignments, including assigning ad hoc Working Groups and Task Forces to assist in their activities. Each Committee is chaired by a President with a term of two years, renewable once. The committee Presidents are also members of the Executive Board.

The Committee Presidium consists of the President and the Vice-Presidents of the committee and will take a joint responsibility for the planning of the committee’s activities.

Please note that delegates in all bodies of AER must hold a regional political mandate, in accordance with AER Statute 1.8. They may give due written authorization for a representative.

The Election Committee will nominate candidates for the elections at the Committees by listing all nominees from the AER Members and nominate one candidate for each position. If necessary, the Election Committee may nominate candidates of its own.

At the Committee Spring Plenaries 2018 the following positions are up for elections:

Committee 1 for Economy & Regional development

Vice-President for Economic Development and Mobility
One female and one male representative for the Equal Opportunities Group
Chair of the working group on Energy and Climate Change
Chair of the working group on Rural Development

Committee 2 for Social policy & Public health

One female representative for the Equal Opportunities Group (her role should be to share a vision for the Committee and provide the necessary impulse for action, advise the Committee President on Equal Opportunities issues as well as insure info flow towards Equal Opportunities Group from Committee 2)
Vice President for Inclusion & Social entrepreneurship (the Committee 2 Vice Presidents advise the Committee 2 President on policy and strategy and support him to represent AER and speak at external events)

Committee 3 for Culture, Education & Youth

President (the current holder, Dag Rønning, Hedmark (NO) has stepped down)
Chair of the Sub-Committee on Education and Training

AER Statute and Procedures about nominations

Per AER Statute and Procedures, the following is applicable to nominations to the General Assembly and the Committees:

In general

Statute 1.5: The bodies of AER are:

a) The governing bodies: The General Assembly and the Executive Board;
b) The Bureau for political discussion, debate and decision making as basis for lobbying and advocacy;
c) The Thematic Committees for exchange and dissemination of best practise and running of programmes and projects.

The composition of all AER bodies should respect a geographical and gender balance.

Statute 1.7: The working language of AER is English.

Statute 1.8: Delegates in all bodies of AER must hold a regional political mandate. They may give due written authorization for a representative. In case of absence or should a delegate’s regional mandate be lost, the Executive Board is, after a period of a maximum of six months, charged to assign a substitute until the next General Assembly.

Statute 1.9: All votes in all AER bodies are by simple majority, defined as more than 50% of those present and voting, unless otherwise specified in the present statute. All elections are carried out by secret ballot, unless a unanimous decision to the contrary is made by the body in question. Other decisions are taken through a vote by show of hands, unless a member requests otherwise. In the event of a tied vote, on issues other than elections, the President of the body in question has the casting vote.

Statute 1.10: Common practice of political assemblies shall be applied to all AER meetings. Decisions are, in principle and whenever possible, adopted by consensus of opinion. The consensus should be understood as being the absence of any objection formulated and submitted by a member which may constitute an obstacle to the decision in question.

The General Assembly

Statute 4.3: Each Full member of AER, after paying the membership dues, has one vote at the General Assembly. The vote will be expressed

a) Directly by one of the representatives of the member region present;
b) By proxy from one absent region to one region present.

Procedures 4.1: Proposals to be presented at the General Assembly, can be submitted up to the evening before the start of the Executive Board meeting preceding the General Assembly.

Procedures 4.1.1: The Executive Board will give its opinion on the proposals to the General Assembly.

The Committees

Statute 9.5: Each Committee is chaired by a President, elected by the General Assembly on proposal by the committee itself and with a term of 2 years, renewable once. The President is responsible for the committee’s smooth running.

Procedures 11.2: Each Committee President’s region is charged to appoint a seconded officer to act as committee secretariat in liaison with the secretariat and, ideally, at the AER office in Brussels. The seconded officer is responsible for:

Co-organise events and projects in collaboration with the secretariat;
Manage the content of the meetings;
Draft speeches and policy contributions

Procedures 11.3: The Committee Presidium consists of the President and the Vice-Presidents of the committee and will take a joint responsibility for the planning of the committee’s activities.

Contact person

The Election Committee is in charge of the organisation of the election process. Mr Brian Greenslade, President of the Election Committee has appointed Mr Kurt Ake Hammarstedt as the contact person. Therefore, all applications and questions relating to the elections should be addressed to:

Kurt Ake Hammarstedt
+46 70 527 83 50

The AER secretariat will not be in a position to answer questions relating to the election process.Follow AER!

Join the Committees’ Presidiums!

26 August, 2017 By Johanna Pacevicius

AER is looking for candidates to fill out newly vacant positions in the Committees’ Presidiums. It includes Vice-President positions and various representative posts inside all three AER Committees. Join the Committees’ leadership and get a profound involvement into AER decision making process!

What’s a Committee Presidium?

The AER Committees are the backbone of our activity. They are the place where knowledge and experience exchange happen and where new collaborations are shaped. To this end Committee members meet at least twice a year on the occasion of their Spring and Autumn plenaries. Workshops are organised along with the statutory meetings in order to dig deeper in specific topics and identify areas for policy innovation. Through experience sharing, including both good and bad practices, AER members engage in mutual learning. Whenever a need arises for focused cooperation on a topic, specific projects are set-up, to ensure the experience exchange will be sustainable and co-funded.

The Committees are led by a Committee President, who is supported by a seconded officer. Each Committee has its own structure and organisation, despite differences in names, they share the following basic structure:

Committee level: President + Vice-President(s)
Subcommittee level: Chairs of ad-hoc structures which can be working groups, subcommittees, focus groups or networks
Representatives for Equal Opportunities: 1 male & 1 female

Members of the Presidium are elected politicians from AER member regions. The members of the Presidium share a vision for the Committee and provide the necessary impulse for action. They advise the Committee President, who sits in the AER Executive Board, thus contributing to strategic decision making.

Committee Presidium members are also invited to represent AER in external events and get extra media coverage via our partnerships with media and events organisations.

Open for candidacies:

Committee 1 on Regional Development & Economy

Committee 1 works on issues covering Cohesion Policy, economic development, innovation and research, climate change, energy and rural development. For the past year, there has also been a strong focus on the circular economy, the development of business/SMEs in specific in the field of health innovation. Long term investments and green investments are also high on the Committee 1 agenda.

The following positions are open for candidacies:

Vice President for Rural development, Energy and Environment
Vice President for Economic Development and Mobility

The Committee 1 Vice Presidents advise the Committee 1 President on policy and strategy and they support him to represent AER and speak at external event.

Representative for Equal opportunities, we are preferably looking for a man with views to gender balance

Mandates last 2 years and are renewable

Candidacies can be sent to the Committee 1 Seconded Officer: Pierre Gérard at [email protected]

Committee 2 on Social Policy & Public Health

The following positions are open for candidacies:

Vice President for Inclusion & Social entrepreneurship

The Committee 2 Vice Presidents advise the Committee 2 President on policy and strategy and they support him to represent AER and speak at external events

Representative for Equal opportunities, we are preferably looking for a woman with views to gender balance

Mandates last 2 years and are renewable

Candidacies can be sent to the Committee 2 Seconded Officer: Agneta Kardos at [email protected]

Committee 3 on Culture, Education and Youth

Committee 3 focuses on culture, education and youth policies. The Committee has been particularly active in the fight against school drop-out. This resulted in the implementation of an ERASMUS+ interregional project to share good practices and improve regional policies for youth inclusion and empowerment. Committee 3 furthermore shared regional good practices in the field of culture for inclusion and cultural heritage.

All positions are fill

Photo by Quino Al on Unsplash

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Social entrepreneurship: partners wanted!

11 May, 2017 By Editor

Europe, as a community of shared values and a framework for collaboration, will only be able to endear itself to the majority of Europeans if it manages to carry a significant social dimension. A social dimension which visibly impacts the lives of Europeans in a positive way. Social entrepreneurship can help growing this social dimension.

Social inclusion: a real need in Europe

Social inclusion is a key aspect for Europe. It, therefore, is also a key policy goal. Indeed, many citizens are still not able to equally benefit of all the opportunities Europe has to offer. Women are still underprivileged in certain respects, young people and elderly people as well. Immigrants often have a hard time to be fully included in their new country. Minorities, such as the Roma or the LGBTI people and communities are also confronted to inequalities. The situation of people with disabilities is yet another illustration of inequalities and exclusion which have to be addressed.

Action plan: from ideas to projects

At the recent AER London plenary meeting, members discussed the actions they want to implement in the coming year. All three AER thematic committees held an individual session about the themes which should be addressed and the actions which would be relevant for members. In Committee 2 one of the prioritized themes was that of social inclusion. The discussion focused on the aspects of social inclusion to be put highest on the agenda but also which strategies would be most effective in promoting and stimulating social inclusion.

Regions attending the London meeting discussed who would be willing and able to lead joint projects and collaborative efforts of member regions in this broad field. The rule of the game being that no proposal could be made without specifically identifying for each action the regions which would be leading the implementation and those which would support it.

Social entrepreneurship, a tool for inclusion

In the discussion on social inclusion, considerable attention was being paid to social entrepreneurship as a method of practically strengthening social inclusion. It was widely recognized that involving the private sector and engaging individual employers are key to really making a difference when it comes to social inclusion and cohesion. Highly relevant is then how to engage entrepreneurs effectively. How to reach them, how to convince them, how to engage them, how to make them act effectively.

Exchanging good practices & developing a project

Participants in the discussion agreed that identifying and exchanging best practices would be very valuable and that the AER network provides an excellent and natural framework for such exchange.

Participants discussed the opportunity of getting co-financing from the European Union for good practice exchange in the context of an EU-funded interregional project. The region of Timis, for instance, presented a project idea focused on good practice sharing for social inclusion.

The province of Flevoland (NL) shared it would be willing to look into the possibility of playing a role in initiating a project around social entrepreneurship, based on the exchange of best practices. Regions also interested in participating in a project focusing on social entrepreneurship are kindly invited to let this know

Regions interested in participating in a project focusing on social entrepreneurship together with the Province of Flevoland are kindly invited to contact AER Coordinator for European Projects and Private Partnerships Agnese Pantaloni or Rutger Schuitemaker at the Province of Flevoland

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INTERREG North West Europe: looking for an innovative project?

6 April, 2017 By Editor

The University of Greenwich (UK) as lead partner, in collaboration with the Royal Borough of Greenwhich and Lille Metropole are developing a project within for the fifth call of INTERREG North West Europe Programme. Activities like exchanges of good practices, especially operational projects including pilot and innovative projects, will be supported within this programme. They plan to design and test an innovative digital platform to foster entrepreneurship and soft skills among inactive young people.

New partners are welcome to join this project!

The project is already at advanced stage and will be applied in the priority axis ‘Innovation’. The actions planned will target excluded population or population at risk of exclusion as well as communities under pressure by delivering societal benefits through innovation. The goal of the project is to bring together partners to develop a shared methodology supporting local economic activity and providing access to essential services such as improving digital skills and promoting entrepreneurship for range of currently disenfranchised groups, concentrating on those between 16-30.

Potential new partners should have the following profile:

local authorities (especially above 250.000 inhabitants)
universities
R&D agencies
non-profit organisations
private partners, including profit-making partners (e.g. SMEs)

and they should be located in the following countries:

the Netherlands
Ireland
Luxembourg
Germany
and Switzerland

Activities undertaken by project partners will be:

to develop a joint research methodology based on design thinking to define a new service,
to carry out needs assessment through a series of workshops involving various stakeholders and young people who is ‘Not in Education, Employment or Training’ (NEETs),
to develop the online platform that will then be tested in different locations and improved based on feedback from service users.

This is a great opportunity to join an interesting project led by very experienced organisations, therefore if you wish to express your interest in joining it, please contact AER Secretariat by 17^th April.Follow AER!

Not your usual plenary meetings

2 March, 2017 By Johanna Pacevicius

The AER Committees are the R&D lab of AER where experiences are shared, discussed, transferred to other regions, transformed, brought back in the network and adopted by yet other regions. However, the plenary meetings don’t always do justice to the wealth of ideas and initiatives regions are implementing or want to implement.

Just do it!

Spring is coming, and at AER, spring is Action plan preparation season.

On 22 March at the AER Spring Plenaries in London, members of the three thematic Committees will develop jointly their action plans. The main idea is the following: if you want to carry out something within the network, just do it! Any idea is welcome!

The actions members can implement via the committees are diverse: project development, organisation of a workshop, seminar, international conference, study visit, brokerage event, breakfast briefing, webinar, collection of good practices, elaboration of a political report based on the experience of regions etc. To have it included in the AER Action Plan, regions should share their idea at the relevant Committee plenary meeting, explain how they are going to implement their action and get support from other regions.

How this will be done

Participants will be seated around round tables, where each table will work around 1 topic (or set of related topics). They will share their own ideas & develop jointly actions on the different topics the Committees are working on:

Committee 1:

Cohesion policy: Task Force on Cohesion post 2020, contribution to the survey, dissemination, awareness raising, lobbying…
business SMEs & investments:
-involvement of regions in the Silver Economy Awards (SEED project)
-Follow-up on photonics: what should be done next?
-E-health innovation, innovative SMEs: after the e-health event, what should now be done?
-The different new models of economy: collaborative, social and solidarity savings, circular, post cop21
– New forms of tourism economy: e-tourism: renting by private persons (Airbnb, …) solidarity tourism….
– Smart regions
– Other proposals

rural development: should something specific be developed this year? If so which region would like to take the lead? Lobbying with the European Countryside Movement, other proposals…
energy, climate change & the circular economy: suggestions are welcome! Dissemination of the report on energy security, collaboration with the R20, with other stakeholders, projects…
transport & mobility: good practice sharing on connectivity, the use of big data, sustainable transports…

Committee 2: Inclusion, social entrepreneurship & inclusive entrepreneurship, digital transformation in health, leadership for change management in health, integrated e-care systems, child healthcare & prevention, follow-up for the MOCHA project, cooperation within EIP-AHA, involvement in the Silver Economy Awards (SEED project)

Committee 3: Cultural heritage (developing a project), culture for inclusion of migrants (handbook), School dropouts (dissemination of the handbook), youth policies, mobility & youth employability, youth wellbeing & inclusion, youth participation, youth entrepreneurship

The 3 plenary meetings will be held separately and consecutively so that members are able to participate in all meetings, allowing for synergies & cooperation between Committees
Members of the AER Youth Regional Network, the Summer Academy and the Eurodyssey programmes are invited to join the process as well so that they can provide ideas on how their work could integrate and feed the work of the committees.

At the end of the session the different actions will be brought together on a flip-chart and organised according to the 3 main categories:

-Lobbying

-Projects

-Good practice exchange

This document will then be adopted as the Committee’s action plan.

Get involved!

In order to get involved AER members can

ask to join the AER Committees online communities in order to already share ideas with other members
identify the needs they have in their region which could be addressed via AER
define an activity they would like to carry out in the Committees, think about how other members could contribute and benefit from this activity, share the idea at the plenary meeting
support other members proposing joint actions via the online communities and at the plenary meetings.

photo credits: Jakob Owens @unsplash https://unsplash.comFollow AER!

INTERREG North West Europe – Fifth call for project proposals!

23 February, 2017 By Editor

On 14th February 2017, an Info Day on the INTERREG North-West Europe Programme was organised by the Brussels Capital Region, Brulocalis (the Association of the City and Municipalities of Brussels) and the Secretariat of the INTERREG North West Europe Programme, at the offices of the Region.

This Info Day, addressed to public and private actors – such as regional organisations, local authorities, associations, companies and universities, gave an overview of the funding possibilities offered by the INTERREG Europe North West Programme.

The INTERREG North West Europe Programme supports cooperation projects between actors based on eight countries: Belgium, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. The activities that can be funded are exchanges of good practices, especially operational projects including pilot and innovative projects. It focuses on three main areas:

• Innovation (including social and entrepreneurial innovation);

• Reduction of carbon emissions (including mobility);

• Rational use of materials and natural resources (including circular economy).

The next deadline for applications is on 24th May 2017 (being the opening on 18th April 2017).

To begin with, a presentation concerning governance, budget, themes, objectives and results of the Programme was given. It was followed by suggestions and good practices for successful INTERREG projects. Then, two beneficiaries of the programme spoke about their experiences: Bruxelles Mobilité (Brussels Mobility) and the City of Liège. Finally, individual interviews were held during the afternoon for potential project promoters.

The next Project Ideas Lab will take place on 28^th March in Luxembourg.

To get more information on the Info Day, presentations are available.

If you wish to submit a project proposal within this call and you need to network with partners, get in touch with AER Secretariat!

Please find below a report on the Info day written by Gianmartino Contu, and translated by Susannah Go.

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Partner search: food surpluses and/or secondary flows

16 January, 2017 By Editor

KOMOSIE (Koepel van Milieuondernemers in de Sociale Economie) is the non-profit umbrella organisation of recognised reuse centres and energy savers in Flanders. Since 2013 Komosie has been building up a new ‘branch’: Foodsaving – being socially active with food surplus and secondary flows. Komosie brings together social economy enterprises that carry out activities with ecological added value and provides them with support for their professional operation. Komosie wants to help protect the environment, all the while creating and maintaining jobs for at-risk groups in the labour market.

KOMOSIE is searching for partners for a project on food surpluses and/or secondary flows, in the framework of the Interreg 2 Seas programme. They want to strengthen the network of social enterprises and organisations that work with food surpluses and/or secondary flows in one or several of the following ways: supply, storage, processing and/or distribution. The aim is to create sustainable jobs for people who have difficulties integrating in the regular job market, while making sure that the product of their activities is ecologically valuable (by reducing food waste and valorising secondary flows) and preferably also supportive to people living in poverty.

In particular, some of the areas in which KOMOSIE is searching for partners are:

Developing/strengthening of knowledge centres in each area of the 2 Seas on the topic of ‘working socially with food surplus and secondary flows’, adapted to the local context
Supporting the creation and functioning of intermediate distribution platforms, both physical platforms and online platforms
Developing or adapting a common registration methodology and system to measure the amount and type of food surplus that is saved by this network of social enterprises and organisations, in relation to the food waste hierarchy and promote the use of it in the region

If you are interested in partnering with KOMOSIE on their project proposal, please contact the AER Secretariat before 27 January 2017.Follow AER!

Entrepreneurship as a tool for regional growth

7 September, 2016 By Elin Berglie

Entrepreneurship is a vital component of economic growth and development. The creation of new business entities not only generates added value, fiscal revenues, employment and innovation, but is an essential ingredient for the development of a vibrant small- and medium-sized business sector—the core of most competitive economies.

Hild Marit Olsen, an Executive of Education from the region of Nordland, talked to the Summer Academy participants about how they integrate entrepreneurship in regional development strategies. Entrepreneurship in a regional perspective has the potential to contribute to specific sustainable development objectives, such as the employment of women, young people or disadvantaged groups, Ms Olsen underlined. Taken into account the increased need of integrating refugees and asylum seekers, a possibility to start up their own businesses might be an important key to success. Social entrepreneurship is a tool for creating arenas for social interactions such as music festivals etc.

Growth-oriented entrepreneurs can also contribute to structural transformation and building new industries, including the development of eco-friendly economic activities, or the green change. We need to focus on how we as a region can increase entrepreneurship, not only about the single entrepreneur.

We have concentrated our work on some policy areas that have a direct impact on entrepreneurial activity. These are:

formulating regional entrepreneurship strategy;
enhancing entrepreneurship education and skills;
facilitating technology exchange and innovation;
improving access to finance;
promoting awareness and networking

As an executive for education, Ms Olsen highlighted the role of education and skills for advancing entrepreneurship in regional development, creating a reciprocity. Regional development can benefit from our work on using education for advancing entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial skills in more than one way, and education can benefit and learn from entrepreneurship:

“Our mission is to prepare the students for life and work, and in my view integrating entrepreneurship into education and training we strengthen our mission with regard to aligning education with the needs of the outside world”.

Integrating entrepreneurship into our curriculum addresses the relevance of education and the development of the skills set of future workers and professionals. Future professionals need a broad set of skills, and the development of entrepreneurial skills are well aligned with recent reports on the future of education.

Entrepreneurship in education also has a pedagogical mission. The quality of teaching and learning can benefit from integrating the world of industry, public service and health into the classroom, thereby creating relevant and motivating learning processes for our students.
Based on our experience we want to continue to strengthen the cooperation between elementary schools and the rest of the educational system and private businesses. In collaboration we may provide new ways of learning science, preparing the next generation for studies at university level and the working life. Experience and positive feedback gives motivated and creative students; In our view the best way of decreasing drop-outs.

We have to create more workplaces and businesses. Even more important, the future generation has to create more workplaces and businesses. The wealth of Norway and Nordland lies in the oil, energy and fish, but the most important of them all is knowledge. And we cannot keep on exporting too many of our brilliant youths to other parts of the country or to the rest of the world. We need them here.

Article contributed by Inga-Lill Sundset from Nordland (NO)

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