Integrated Cross-Sectorial Plan of Tirana-Durres Area

competitiveness, focusing on a globally
interconnected economy. This means that they
should foster cooperation between regional
actors for the development of the enterprise’s
economic network by providing supportive
conditions and platforms for regional actors
to operate as complementary and competitive
units of each other, supported by research
and development for innovation, for globally
operating branded products.
2. Developing social capital: networks, ties,
trust, distribution of values and behaviours
of the population. Both central and local
governments should provide the right
environment to increase productivity per
person, by developing fiscal and legal
instruments in support of human capital,
lifelong knowledge and skills, ensuring
that the potential and dissemination of
development is maximized so that the entire
region can contribute and take advantage of
the positive results.
3. Developing human knowledge capital: skills,
knowledge, creativity. Creating dedicated
frameworks, platforms and grants that support
and promote research and development
investment to ensure that the region continues
to play a leading role in the knowledge-based
economy network. Building the “knowledge
economy” will serve to create a region with a
focus on the innovation of regional enterprise
products, where the latter will reach the right
climate to create globally known brands.
4. Developing the physical capital and
supporting infrastructure for the production
of goods and services (transport networks,
ICT communication networks, technological
development areas, buildings, machinery,
etc.). Infrastructural development of the region
should rely on investments and projects that
foster municipal cooperation to work under
a regional development framework, ensuring
efficient mobility, safe energy supply with clean
energy and low environmental pollution. The
development of strategic mobility and ICT
infrastructure are basic factors for promoting
the achievement of development poles. As
such, these networks should be supported
by the development of the regional gateways
to provide the necessary regional links with
the Western Balkans and the Mediterranean
countries.
5. The region needs to provide efficient
platforms and services based on smart
technologies that promote information and
decision-making of local residents in the
implementation of local democracy.
This approach will provide a framework that
facilitates and promotes interaction with
residents and businesses by creating proactive
decision-making on future development
directions.
6. Developing environmental capital: the
environmental and natural physical quality
around which people work and live. The
protection and sustainable development of
the territory should be guided by the creation
of an environment of high physical and
environmental quality, promoting a balanced
territorial development within the region.
These steps provide for the establishment of
a basic framework to return the metropolitan
region into an essential gateway to the Balkans
and the Mediterranean. In order to ensure
a sustainable growth in the 21st century
economy, the plan will foster the development
of territorial poles supported by “specialized
employment”, clustering of enterprises and
branches of the economy, as well as the
development of the global value chain. 17
EP1- Develop service economy
Enterprises in the region are shifting the focus
of operations from the product manufacturing
economy to the services one. The analysis of
these regional actors shows that added value
services are attracted mainly to urban centres
in Tirana and Durres, as the latter provide
physical and digital connections to the network
of global urban centres to a satisfactory level.
In this context, the plan supports and promotes
17
http://www.oecd.org/sti/inno/smart-specialisation.pdf
http://s3platform.jrc.ec.europa.eu/documents/20182/96243/Global+Value+Chains+and+Smart+Specialisation+Strategy/8546
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