Assessing Territorial Attractiveness in SEE 

Effective monitoring system and better coordination among different development and sectoral policies are basic conditions for achieving territorial cohesion and territorial development goals on transnational, national, regional and local level. Project ATTRACT-SEE will support policy makers to achieve better coordination of territorial cohesion and growth policies as well as their implementation and evaluation. The aim of the project is to establish a framework concept as well as tools useful for policy makers to enhance the quality of development decisions. The results of the project are to be used by policy/decision makers in improving their cooperation and networking at the South East Europe scale, in view to reinforce the role of territorial knowledge in promoting cohesion and growth in South East Europe. To support policy makers two main interlinked sets of actions are designed in the project. Firstly a common concept of territorial monitoring will be established: Common territorial monitoring framework. The objective is to create a model of monitoring system suited to the needs of policy and decision makers, in view to provide outputs useful for supporting policy development and implementation. The model supports evidence based policy development and implementation in partner states and regions. Through establishment of a shared system of indicators the model will then be applied to monitor territorial quality and attractiveness. Secondly a policy coordination process will be designed - promoting, supporting and actively moderating participation and involvement of policy and decision makers from different sectors and administrative levels. For the project partnership it is of highest importance to improve communication and cooperation among different policy and decision makers and sets it as a carefully planned and moderated process in which all involved stakeholders are treated on an equal base. Project is based on actual needs expressed by policy makers and stakeholders of several sectors and administrative levels as well as from spatial planners. National and regional stakeholders in spatial planning who are to be moderators of this process are represented in the project partnership. Their expectation is to develop tools and procedures, gain skills and competences needed to monitor and understand complicated territorial development trends and to transfer this knowledge to an integrated policy development process. Concrete outputs as Common territorial monitoring framework, Transnational as well as national/regional territorial quality and attractiveness reports, Policy coordination process handbook and workshops will enable them to create and/or strengthen permanent stakeholder networks coordinating different policies' goals, objectives and implementation measures. Policy coordination is seen as a permanent and continuous process by project partners and for this reason improvement of capacity of partners to facilitate and drive the process is crucial. The Territorial monitoring framework will be designed in a way allowing project partners its further development adding additional indicators, depending on their specific situation and needs. Partners will also prepare action plans on how they will adapt the Territorial monitoring framework and establish permanent Territorial monitoring system in their country/region, which will become a tool enabling partners to comprehensively monitor spatial planning policies implementation giving valuable inputs for monitoring impacts of sectoral policies. Policy coordination process, stakeholder network and the Territorial monitoring system which will be established in each participating country/region will lead to better coordination among different development and sectoral policies, to more quality decisions based on territorial knowledge and hence to better implementation of territorial cohesion goals.