(11 December 2017) – The new Platform launched today will facilitate the development of projects and long-term strategies in coal regions. It will bring together EU, national, regional and local stakeholders involved in the transition to help them foster partnerships and learn from each other’s experiences.
The Platform’s activities will initially focus on coal regions, with the aim to expand to carbon-intensive regions in the future. It is designed to boost the clean energy transition by bringing more focus to social fairness, structural transformation, new skills and financing for the real economy.
In parallel, the Commission is working on a pilot basis with a small number of regions in Member States on planning and accelerating the process of economic diversification and technological transition through technical assistance, information exchange and tailored bilateral dialogue on relevant EU funds, programmes and financing tools.
Pilot country teams for Slovakia, Poland and Greece were established in the second half of 2017 to assist the regions of Trencin, Silesia and Western Macedonia based on their specific needs. As the work of these teams progresses, their experiences will be shared with the Platform for Coal Regions in Transition.