Strategies for regional sustainable development

The project helped to develop strategies for regional sustainable development, by promoting regional and social cohesion as well as of environmental protection and sustainability are among the most important Community objectives. Project REGIONET contributed to the knowledge that helps to better integrate environmental issues in regional sustainable development plans and management (also now needed for Structural Funds proposals) and to integrate environmental protection with economic development and social policy. The project explicitly addressed these issues by organising four workshops which brought together different stakeholders, i.e. policy-makers, researchers, business/industry, and users/consumers.

Specific Objectives

The thematic network REGIONET had the following specific objectives:

  • The improved integration of sustainability issues in the regional development plans put forward to the EU structural funds.
  • An understanding of the relationship between the implementation of regional sustainable development and issues of regional and multi-level governance.
  • An integrated framework for evaluating regional sustainable development (methods and tools) at the European, national and regional levels.
  • The cross-fertilisation of sustainable development research and the establishment of regional partnerships.

Outputs

The outputs of REGIONET were:

  • Four workshops to bring together various stakeholders and elaborate on regional sustainable development.
  • Edited books and other academic publications to contribute to the scientific discourse on regional sustainable development.
  • ‘Recommendations+’ as a practical policy guide for regional sustainable development in Europe.
  • A project website to provide information on upcoming events, network members and experts, information on other relevant projects, download reports.

See more: Strategies for regional sustainable development