News
New report by the Commission: "EU border regions: living labs of European integration"
September 2021
This European Commission report, published on 13 July, looks at the lessons of the Covid crisis and the initiatives carried out since the publication of its 2017 Communication “Boosting growth and cohesion in EU border regions”.
It recalls the need to strengthen cross-border cooperation to make these regions more resilient and develop their potential in the face of persistent obstacles.
The 2017 Communication highlighted the remaining obstacles to cross-border cooperation. Ten actions were proposed to address them. These actions are reviewed in the Commission’s new report with a view to strengthening the role of cross-border territories as major drivers of European integration.
The report sets out the progress made over the past few years through examples of good practices and the setting-up of initiatives such as the b-solutions initiative launched in 2017, which has helped to identify the main causes of legal and administrative obstacles and to put forward solutions to tackle them.
The actions proposed to strengthen cross-border cooperation are grouped into four main clusters:
1) Resilience through deeper institutional cooperation
2) More and better cross-border public services
3) Vibrant cross-border labour markets
4) Border regions for the European Green Deal
For each area, the report sets out the current situation, the actions carried out by the Commission to tackle the obstacles and the future actions planned.
