Irish Regions Office Website

March 07, 2008

Innovative Regions Awards

RegioStars is the awards system for the most innovative ERDF or Cohesion Fund co-financed project relating to economic modernization involving the EU's regions.

Tied in with the Regions for Economic Change initiative it sets out to identify especially good practices in regional development and to highlight original approaches and methodologies which could be more widely trialled and implemeneted in other regions. A ceremony in Brussels in February profiled a shortlist of 26 finalists (from 71 projects nominated) before the prizes for 2008 across 3 categories went to Alsace ('energy efficiency and renewable energies'); Oresund and Wales (both 'support clusters and business networks'); and West Midlands and Yorkshire & Humber (both 'technology transfer from research institutes to SMEs'). The search for the 2009 winners is now underway with nominations being sought for specified activities in the fields of 'Research, Technological Development and Innovation'; and 'adaptation to or mitigation of climate change'. Nominees may be part of a succession of projects that are sequentially funded by one of the EU financial instruments or may have been demonstrably inspired by a good practice in a region of another Member State. Further details from: http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/cooperation/interregional/ecochange/regiostars_en.cfm?nmenu=4

Posted by iroronan at March 7, 2008 04:50 PM