Umbrella 2.0 Report: “Entry points” to EUSBSR Cooperation

Euroregion “Baltic” presents the report called Entry points to EUSBSR cooperation prepared within the Umbrella 2.0. project.

The report is aimed to help all institutions directly or indirectly involved in implementing the EUSBSR to learn more about the importance of improved collaboration with the local level of governance to achieve the goals outlined in the Strategy. For two months, the experts conducted a series of 14 interviews with Coordinators of all Policy Areas of the Strategy, attempting on the one hand to gain a broad picture of the current status of local stakeholders’ participation but also to listen to interesting ideas and proposals on what should be done further to integrate them in the works of the Strategy. To this end, Euroregion “Baltic” asked several questions through which they have received a great deal of interesting feedback and some concrete proposals for the future of the EUSBSR implementation.

The resulting report is directed both towards the local stakeholders who are newcomers to the Strategy as well as those local actors who are more experienced in Baltic cooperation but would like to organize their knowledge and understanding of how the Strategy can be of use for them.

We hope that this report will help all institutions directly or indirectly involved in implementing the EUSBSR to learn more about the importance of improved collaboration with the local level of governance to achieve the goals outlined in the Strategy.

The Umbrella 2.0 project has been developed precisely to make the European Union Strategy for Baltic Sea Region (EUSBSR) more “user-friendly” for the local stakeholders. The Umbrella 2.0 project was initiated by the Euroregion Baltic (ERB) and is implemented throughout 2021 with two partners: Union of the Baltic Cities (UBC) and Baltic Sea States Subregional Cooperation (BSSSC). This project is funded by the Swedish Institute, which has supported Baltic Sea cooperation for many years, especially among the local actors. The project also builds on two previous capacity building projects successfully implemented by the Euroregion Baltic and its Partners within the Interreg South Baltic Programme.