Committee of the Regions and European Commission looking for OPEN DAYS partners

15 December 2006

The Committee of the Regions (CoR) and European Commission's Regional Policy Directorate General (DG REGIO) have issued an invitation to regions and cities to be partners in OPEN DAYS 2007 – European Week of Regions and Cities.

The event, jointly organised by the CoR, DG REGIO and over 100 regions and cities from all over Europe, includes a wider partnership with banks, enterprises and non-governmental and international organisations in addition to authorities from countries outside the EU.

Between 8 and 11 October, more than 100 OPEN DAYS workshops and sessions will focus on the new generation of cohesion policy programmes, which will be implemented in the course of 2007 in all European regions. Between 2007 and 2013, public and private funding made available through these programmes will amount to about EUR 500 billion.

The title of next years' event will be Making it happen: Regions deliver growth and jobs and will include five sub-themes: Attracting investors: Regions and cities show how it works;
Proximity matters: Clusters and regional development;
Spending it wisely: Public-private partnerships and financial engineering;
Crossing borders: Cooperation and exchange of best practice supporting growth and jobs;
Efficient delivery: How the new programmes are implemented.

The OPEN DAYS seminars will be accompanied by the Investor's Café, a meeting point for regional policy experts where regional authorities, private companies and institutions can choose to join a specific thematic "village" under categories including: transport, education, research and development, sustainable development, health and financial engineering. In addition, the OPEN DAYS will go local through events in participating regions and cities all over Europe from 1-7 and 12-31 October.

The deadline for regions and cities wishing to apply as partners is 14 February at 12.00am. To be considered, regions and cities must apply to participate as part of a conglomerate, which should consist of a minimum of 5 partners.

The partner offices which are selected to participate in the OPEN DAYS 2007 – European Week of Regions and Cities will be announced at the end of February 2007 and the workshops and seminars programme finalised before the end of April.

More information: www.opendays.europa.eu