Complementarities between urban and rural areas in promoting ...

COMPLEMENTARITIES BETWEEN URBAN AND RURAL AREAS IN PROMOTING EMPLOYMENT AND SOCIAL INCLUSIONbehind this concept was to establish the partnershipduring these six months in order todevelop a joint strategy, to mutually define thenature of the problem, and to assess whatoptions for solutions and resources exist andhow they can be mobilised. The first instance ofthis process was undertaken between November2001 and May 2002.EQUAL is built on the principles of transnationality,partnership and empowerment. In additionthere is also the principle of innovation whichmeans that one has to find new ways of organisingand connecting work with other aspects oflife: a new means of working which facilitates abalance between family life, leisure, training andwork is being initiated. Finally an important elementthat has to be integrated from the beginningis mainstreaming, that is to say the integrationof what has been learnt should be putinto practice at every level. Under ADAPT, therewere a number of projects in the field of jobrotation. This was first developed in Denmarkwhere unemployed people are recruited for alimited period of time to work in companies, ona temporary basis, to replace existing staff whowere being trained. This again is an interface ofhow to combine those institutions dealing withunemployed people and those institutions thatdeal with training, as well as how to find fundingarrangements combining the two. Differenttypes of models have been applied to small companies,large companies, and to urbanised ruralareas. These experiments have been successfulwhere they have found a way to validate theresults and discovered an approach to overcomingthe obstacles in the current legislativeregime. In some member states, platforms andassociations were formed to lobby parliamentarians.This in turn resulted in new legislation, forexample in Portugal, Italy and Germany.WHAT HAS BEEN ACHIEVED SO FAR?In the first round of the EQUAL initiative, memberstates who implement this programme haveselected 1,500 development partnerships in ninethematic fields which were agreed upon bymember states as being problem areas where itis necessary to cooperate and to learn from oneanother. Between November 2001 and spring2002, 1,500 development partnerships havebeen established. They have developed a strategyand have agreed on a work plan that commits allpartners for the next two years. Thematicallyspeaking, there is a concentration on the facilitationof access to the labour market, especiallyfor the long-term unemployed. More than halfof these partnerships are regional or local partnerships,which means that they all work in thesame region and they tackle a specific problemthat is evident in one of these regions. Approximatelyten partners work together in each of thepartnerships and most of them include a local orregional authority, one or more have strategic oroperational partners, and a number of them havemanaged to include NGOs. In addition, platformshave been set up for the validation of experienceand for the identification of good practice alreadyimplemented. It is intended that European networks,where the coordinators of the partnershipsmeet organisations working at Europeanlevel, work together on a number of specificissues which are relevant to the political agenda.These platforms are also intended to provide anexchange of best practice. Different memberstates have different experiences. Some of themare outside EQUAL and the Commission is tryingto integrate these in order to facilitate progress.It should not be forgotten that although EQUALrepresents only 5 percent of the European StructuralFund in absolute terms, this programmeaccounts for around 3 billion euro. Complementarynational funding also exists.— 20 —