News&Events

08.11.07
The final conference of BEN ("Baltic Euroregional Network") project took place on 24-26 October 2007 in Jelgava, Latvia

Project's "Baltic Euroregional Network" final conference which took place in Jelgava, Latvia on 24-26 October was opened by a basketball competition between the teams of BEN, BEN-East and Zemgale (Latvia) that showing that cross-border cooperation can unite people in the struggle not only for economic prosperity of the regions, but also for sport achievements! Each of the team showed high level of playing, but the host team (Zemgale region) was stronger and solider that enabled it to get the first prize. The second place went to BEN-East team. That competition was the first sport event in the history of BEN and BEN-East projects.

BEN project, aiming at development of cross-border cooperation in the Baltic Sea Region, started in October 2005. 35 partners from Belarus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia and Sweden took part in the project. Lead partner of the project has been Office of the Nordic Council of Ministers in Lithuania (coordinator - Šarūnas Radvilavičius). The first event held within the project was a roundtable in Estonia. During the project implementation seminars on various topics were organized (Northern Dimension policy, regional development, legal status of cross-border structures/Euroregions, tourism development and forming a common labour market on border territories, PR in promotion CBC activities and so on), roundtables and summer schools were held, four newsletters, e-library and best-practice handbook on CBC activities were issued.

During the official part of the conference main outputs of the project were summarized, representatives of partner organizations presented reports on highlights of the Work Packages in which project activities had been divided. Besides, Šarūnas Radvilavičius talked about further strategy of BEN project that was worked out by the steering committee and approved by 34 partners. While working on the strategy project partners discussed different options for the future network: founding a new formal organization; merging of the BEN into one of the existing Baltic Sea Region or European networks; creating a network as an informal platform chaired and coordinated by partners on the principal of rotation. As a result, it was decided to establish an informal network which will be finance and coordinated by the Nordic Council of Ministers. Besides the overall coordination of the network, it is essential that new projects are originated among BEN partners.

The final stage of the official part of the conference was devoted to presentations of follow-up projects those ideas had been emerged from the co-operation within BEN: Pavel Petrov held a presentation about BEN-East ("Baltic Euroregional Network-East") project implementation, Olga Vasilenko spoke about the programme "Transboundary Eco-Education" in which realization NGO "Chudskoye Project" takes part; Raitis Madzulis informed the audience about cooperation between Zemgale region (Latvia) and the Republic of Karelia (Russia).

Within the frames of the conference a technical visit to Euroregion Saule including RAF Business incubator complex (former RAF factory that produced automobiles) and Rundale Palace was organized (Earl Biron's summer residence).

The event was organized by Zemgale Planning Region and Council of the Baltic Sea States.

Programme of the conference >>

Practical information >>

Strategy for the future of the Baltic Euroregional Network >>

More about BEN-project >>

E-edition "Pskovskaya Lenta Novostej" (Photo gallery) >>