(15 June 2015) – The European Commission adopted on 11 June the new interregional cooperation programme (“Interreg Europe”) between all EU Member States with the participation of Norway and Switzerland, worth more than EUR 359 million from the ERDF. The programme will focus on supporting the exchange of experience, the transfer of good practices, and joint initiatives among the regions.
The programme will finance Interregional Cooperation projects between partners coming from different countries in Europe who will work together for 3 to 5 years to exchange their experiences on a particular policy issue covered by the programme – whether it is innovation, support to SMEs, low carbon economy or environmental protection.
Each region involved in the cooperation project will produce an Action Plan to ensure that the lessons learnt from the cooperation are put into action. Regions will also have access to Policy Learning Platforms where any organisation dealing with regional development policies in Europe will be supported by experts to improve the way they manage and implement public policies in the four topics above.
The first call for projects will be closed in the second half of 2015. Public partners will receive up to 85% of EU funding for their project activities, and the private sector up to 75%.