Regional Focus
Date: 01 jun 2010
Period: 2007-2013
Theme: Research and innnovation, Structural Funds management and Governance
Languages: en
Over the past 15 years, the European Commission has supported the building up of Regional Innovation Strategies by regional partnerships through pilot projects and programmes. For the current programming period, the Community strategic guidelines for 2007–2013 indicate that one of the roles of Cohesion Policy in the innovation field is ‘helping regions to implement regional innovation strategies and action plans which potentially can have a significant impact on competitiveness, both at regional level and in the Union as a whole’.In order to understand better how this role was accommodated in the 2007–2013 operational programmes (OPs), the European Commission launched a study covering 14 regions throughout the European Union. This study provides an overview of and insight into different approaches towards innovation and the contribution of the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) programmes. The regions concerned are: Piedmont, Western Sweden, Pays de la Loire, Pomorskie, Lithuania, Prague, Steiemark, South Netherlands, Lowlands & Uplands Scotland, Saxony, Central Tansdanubia, Denmark, Slovenia, and East of England.