Westpomerania

BSSSC Chairmanship

During the Chairmanship of West Pomerania the BSSSC supported and developed traditional policy areas such as maritime policy, climate change, transport and infrastructure, education and youth.

2011-2012

Pomorze Zachodnie

West Pomerania is one of the five largest regions in Poland. The capital of the region is Szczecin – the city with almost a half of million inhabitants located near Polish-German border; the seat of many regional institutions and universities; the headquarter of NATO's Multinational Corps Northeast and the biggest city of Euroregion Pomerania.

Development of West Pomerania is determined by its location in the Baltic Sea Region, at the crossroads of North-South and East-West trade axes, near Scandinavia and Berlin. Modern sea ports, navigable Odra river fairway and fruitful Polish-German crossborder cooperation also have positive impact on economic growth of the region. Improvements in transport and technical infrastructure contribute to increasing spatial competitiveness of the region, facilitates attracting new investments and stimulating exports.

Westpomeranian
Region

The Chairmanship of the Westpomeranian Region 2011-2012 focused on:

the shaping of cohesion policy,
the implementation process of the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region,
the engagement of other Baltic regions to the BSSSC network,
the promotion of the BSSSC across Europe.

The Chairmanship proceeded to strengthen the involvement of Russian partners, especially on the basis of the bilateral cooperation of Hamburg with St. Petersburg and West Pomerania with Kaliningrad Region.

Nowadays Europe faces a number of long-term challenges which have an impact on the structural changes across Europe. Following that, it was crucial for the Westpomeranian Chairmanship to ensure the role of regions in shaping the future European polices with special attention to the new programming period. In this respect, BSSSC and its members was and are essential actors in providing clear responses to these challenges and underlining the position of regions as a real stakeholders of European funds.

The Polish Chairmanship was based on the values of cooperation, mutual respect and dialogue with other policy-making organizations such as CBSS, CoR, B7, UBC, BSPC, Northern Dimension. Looking towards the European Union, the Presidency wished to maintain fruitful cooperation with the European Commission, appreciating its involvement in the creation and implementation of the EU Strategy for the Baltic Sea Region.

The Chairmanship intended to support innovative interregional projects as they bring added value for all regions around the Baltic Sea. The BSSSC aimed to foster the project-oriented cooperation, based on exchange of solutions and focused on technology transfer. There is a strong believe, among the BSSSC members, that only through such a cooperation the sustainable development of all BSR regions can be assured.