Mr Philippe Monfort

Mr Philippe Monfort

European Commission - DG Regional Policy

Speech on 'Territorial Cohesion and Policy Making'

ESPON 2013 InfoDays

13September 2011 - Brussels

1. Introduction

Dear Madam, dear sir,

It is a great pleasure for me to be here today and I would like to thank the ESPON programme and its coordination unit for inviting me to this InfoDay launchinga new call for proposals on Applied Research, Targeted Analysis and Scientific Platform projects. I would like to take this opportunity to say a word about this new objective of "Territorial Cohesion" which is now explicitly mentioned in the Treaty and how this partly guides the reform of the EU Cohesion Policy that we now launch in the perspective of preparing the post 2013 programmes. This will naturally lead to explain what the Commission expects from the project which are about to be launched today.

The territorial dimension has been at the core of Cohesion Policy since its inception. However, it is only in the 1990s that is was recognised that the manner public policies addressterritorial needs should be substantially improved. The adoption of the European Spatial Development Perspective in 1999, followed by the Territorial Agenda in 2007 gave a strong emphasis on the need to focus national and regional territorial developmentpolicies on making the most of territorial assets.

In 2007, the European Parliament and the informal ministerial meetings of ministers responsible for urbandevelopment and Territorial Cohesion in Leipzig in 2007asked the Commission to prepare a paper on Territorial Cohesion. As a result, the Green Paper on Territorial Cohesion was published in 2008 toconsolidate opinion and shape a way ahead.

With the entry into force of the Treaty of Lisbon on 1 December 2009, territorial cohesion has become a new policy goal of the European Union on equal foot with economic and social cohesion.

1. Territorial Cohesion and Policy Making

Territorial Cohesion first gives much strength to the argument that we need a territorial counterpoint to large,EU-wide, sectoral policies. It also makes clear that policy needs to be adapted at local level to workwell.

Adding territorial cohesion to the objectives of the Treaty recognises explicitly that "geography matters". In other words, more consideration needs to be given in all the Union's policies to the need for the harmonious and balanced development of the Union's territory, with the objective of better exploiting its diversity and potential.

This requires a change in sectoral policy planning. The emphasis is on place-based policymakingwith the word ‘territory’meaning first that policies must be tailored to the local context and that authorities needto know the lay of the land before formulating policy.

1. How Cohesion policy reforms build on this approach

How do our proposals for the future of Cohesion Policy build on this approach? I would like to discuss four points here:

1) more integration and better coordination;

2) Selecting investment priorities and conditions in a dialogue

3) role of regions and cities

4) targets and results

3.1.More integration and better coordination

Cohesion policy will be a key delivery mechanism of the Europe2020 strategy. Let me get rid of amisunderstanding: the apparent conflict between Europe2020 andCohesion Policy. This is a false problem. The Europe2020 goals are about improving Europe's growth perspective, improving the quality of life of EU citizens, making our economies more competitive and improving our environment. These arealso the objectives of Cohesion Policy.

The Common Strategic Framework, we have proposed, should improve coordination between actions funded by different policies (cohesion policy as well as rural development and fisheries policies) not only at the EU but also at MemberStatelevel.

3.2.Identifying investment priorities and conditions in a dialogue

An integrated approach does not mean a programme should invest in everything. In these difficult times, public investment should be aimed at a small number of growth-enhancing investment priorities. We have called this thematic concentration. The Commission is preparing list of these themes currently, which is not an easy task. The appropriate themes will determined through a dialogue with the MemberStates and regions. We are preparing an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of each MemberState and their regions to support this dialogue. These priorities will be included in the new partnership contract.

But this is not enough. During the discussion on the strengthening of economic governance, we agreed that the EU needs to address more strongly concerns over stability, structural reforms, and competitiveness. Financial support from the EU, including Cohesion Policy, therefore has to become more conditional. These conditions should be universal, transparent, and proportional. They should encourage structural reforms by Member States through linking disbursement of funds to progress in areas directly linked to the operation of the policy, for example in the area of environmental protection, business environment or administrative capacity. This should help create the right framework to make cohesion policy more effective. This dialogue on thematic priorities and conditions is directly related to the recommendations of the Barca report.

3.3.The role of regions and cities

Cohesion policy has a key comparative advantage through its close link to regions and cities. It can create local ownership of European strategies. One of the key lessons we learntfrom the Lisbon strategy is that policies designed far away from firmsand people face problems of implementation.

One of my political priorities is to promote is the stronger involvement of cities in regional policy. Cities are at the forefront of innovation, but also of poverty and exclusion. Cities are one of the answers to climate change due to their higher eco-efficiency, but issues such as crime and pollution undermine the appeal of urban living. Cities also have strong ties with their surroundings and other cities. Therefore, we want to promote a stronger involvement of cities in Cohesion Policy, more cooperation between cities and their surroundings and better networking between cities.

3.4.Targets and results

In the next period, we want programmes to explain what they want to change and monitor these changes. This means they have to identify the indicators that will measure these changes. To facilitate this process we are developing a list of outcome indicators for programmes to use. Some are already available through Eurostat, others will have to be collected by the programmes and projects.

In addition to a stronger targeting and monitoring of the policy, this approach helps to measure the positive impact of cohesion policy. To justify the continuation of the policy in a time when all member states are under severe fiscalpressure, we must ensure that the policy produces good rate of returns and that these returns can be demonstrated.

1. How can ESPON support such process

From what precedes, it is obvious how important the role of ESPON is. For a number of reasons, but I would kike to mention the following in particular:

-The need to refine and improve our measurement capacities. This is capital to deepen our understanding of EU territories, to be able to more accurately assess territorial outcomes and correctly gauge the effectiveness of our interventions. This is particularly true for territorial indicators;

-The need to understand better how and how deeply the challenges we face in the future will affect EU territories and the balance of their development, so as to be able to provide appropriate policy responses;

-The need to provide policy makers the necessary knowledge on the development of the European territory. From this point of view, the policy orientation of the ESPON work programme and the dissemination of its results are critical.

All these aspects are extensively covered by the ESPON programme and the themes which have been selected for this call for proposals are clearly in line with the agenda of the Commission:

-Compared to other parts of the world, Europe is characterised by its large number of small and medium size towns. A balanced and polycentric development of the European territory is a key challenge of territorial and the Commission pays an increasing attention to the role of the small and medium-sized towns for territorialdevelopment in Europe. In particular, exploiting synergies and complementarities between the European towns could help us to generate the agglomeration economies which usually materialise in large cities.

-Combating poverty and social exclusion is one of the main pillars of the Europe 2020 strategy which Cohesion Policy will support. However, our knowledge of the territorial dimension of poverty and social exclusion could definitely be improved. In particular, we need to better understand the territorial distribution of such phenomenon, how they could be monitored at territorial level and what type of response should placed-based policies propose.

-Finally, in the future Cohesion Policy the place of sustainable development will significantly be strengthened. Many actions in this field must in priority be implemented at local level. Projects like LIVEABLE LANDSCAPES should help us better understand how the integration of landscape management into spatial planning can best serve the purpose of a balance territorial development.

These are just examples. All the future research which will soon be launched under the ESPON programme represents a great deal of interest in regards to the Commission's priorities and expectations on our side is as high as our needs in the fields which will be covered. I therefore hope that this interest will be shared by the scientific community which you represent today and that this call will offer other outstanding opportunities to collaborate on these very interesting issues.

Thank you for your attention.