Council of Europe’s role in regional planning

Doc. 9023

10 April 2001

Council of Europe’s role in regional planning

Recommendation 1461 (2000)

Reply from the Committee of Ministers

adopted at the 748^th meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies (3 April 2001)

The Committee of Ministers has considered Recommendation 1461 (2000) on the Council of Europe’s role in regional planning and took note of the specific recommendations made by the Parliamentary Assembly.

Concerning the first recommendation (18.i) related to cooperation with the European Union with a view to coherence and complementary action, the Committee of Ministers has always paid particular attention to this cooperation. In accordance with the arrangements between the Council of Europe and the European Community supplemented by the exchange of letters of 5 November 1996 between the Secretary General of the Council of Europe and the President of the European Commission, co-operation has taken, in the field of regional planning, the following form:

- the European Commission may send representatives to the meetings of the Council of Europe expert Committees in general, including those working in the field of regional planning, such as: the Steering Committee for Local and Regional Democracy (CDLR), the Committee of Experts on Local Finance and the Select Committee of Experts on Transfrontier Cooperation; the Group of Specialists “Tourism and Environment”;

- co-financing by the European Commission of activities connected with the activity “Architecture without Frontiers” cultural route based on rural habitats;

- participation of the European Commission in the elaboration of a draft additional protocol to the European Outline Convention on Transfrontier Cooperation between Territorial Communities or Authorities;

- participation of the European Commission in a number of Council of Europe events, for example, a Council of Europe’s seminar on the “Challenges facing the European society with the approach of the year 2000: Public participation in regional/spatial planning in different European countries” (Bath, 26-27 April 1995); the Fourth Conference of Mediterranean Regions (Cyprus, 20-22 September 1995); the conference on “The regional planning of greater Europe” in cooperation with the countries of Central and Eastern Europe (Prague, 16-17 October 1995); and the 12th Session of the European Conference of Ministers responsible for Regional Planning held in Hanover, Germany (7-8 September 2000).

The Guiding Principles for Sustainable Spatial Development of the European continent, adopted at this session, take into account the European Union’s European Spatial Development Perspective. The Committee of Senior Officials of the CEMAT will develop co-operation and synergetic efforts with the European Union to implement both instruments. This is a clear example of the steps taken by the Council of Europe and the European Union to increase coherence and complementarity of action in this field.

The Council of Europe, for its part, for example, participated in an informal meeting of Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning and Regional Policy of the European Union (under the Finnish Presidency, Tampere, 4-5 October 1999).

Concerning the development of relations with other sub-regional intergovernmental organisations working in the field of regional planning (18.ii), such as Black Sea Economic Co-operation (BSEC) and the Central European Initiative, such organisations will be invited to participate in the CEMAT’s seminars and in the 13th session of the CEMAT (Ljubljana, 2003). In general, the Committee of Ministers finds such co-operation very useful and important in terms of exchanging experience and opinions on regional planning matters.

Concerning the development of such sectors of activity as transborder and interregional co-operation (18.iii), the Committee of Ministers points out that these are among the Organisation’s priorities. At the above-mentioned 12th Session of the European Conference of Ministers responsible for Regional Planning (CEMAT) organised by the Council of Europe, concrete spatial development projects in co-operation with the European Commission (INTERREG) has received special attention.

Moreover, in the context of the technical co-operation of the Council of Europe with member states from Central and Eastern Europe, several Agreements of co-operation have been elaborated. The recent signature of a Co-operation Agreement between Romania, Ukraine and the Republic of Moldova on the establishment and joint management of a transfrontier protected area in the Danube Delta and the lower River Prut, on 5 June 2000 in Bucharest, is one of the examples. This Agreement’s Joint Commission first met on 16 December 2000 and adopted a Work Programme for this area.

As regards the adoption of the draft European Framework Convention on mountain regions (18.iv), the CEMAT, at its 12th Session, has not followed this proposal.

The majority of the Ministers of Regional Planning preferred the idea of intensifying transnational co-operation in concrete spatial development projects.

Thus the Committee of Ministers sees, at this stage, no possibility of adopting such a Convention.

As regards the reconsideration of the draft European Charter on the Danube Basin, with a view to its adoption (18.v), the Deputies will come back to this question when considering Parliamentary Assembly Recommendation 1480 (2000) on the Protection and management of the Danube Basin.