Past successes and future challenges: summarising ERB 20th Anniversary

On February 14-16, Euroregion Baltic celebrated its 20th Anniversary during a 3 days long series of meetings and conferences hosted by ERB International Permanent Secretariat in Elbląg. The celebration, which saw the participation of nearly 150 guests representing delegations from Russia, Poland, Sweden, Denmark and Lithuania, was a good opportunity to take stock of the situation, capitalise the results achieved over the last 20 years and lay the foundation for a fruitful future cooperation.

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On November 2, 2017 the Pan-European Institute published the Baltic Rim Economies review, issue no. 3. The BRE review offers authoritative comments on a wide range of topics involving the Baltic Sea Region. (more…)

The EcoDefense, an NGO based in Kaliningrad, is looking for partners, possibly Nordic NGOs, for a project aimed to study and protect the tree avenues of Kaliningrad region, to be submitted to the NGO Support Program of the Nordic Council of Ministers.

The project is to strengthen civil environmental rights through protection of an important element of our common historical, natural, and cultural landscape, the avenues, through cooperation and good practices transfer by Nordic, Baltic, Polish and Kaliningrad NGOs.

The avenues, or green corridors of Europe, are lines of trees by sides of roads and streets. They present European rich natural and cultural heritage and need to be cared now and preserved for future generations. With their aesthetic, environmental, and economic values, the tree-lined avenues form a living environment for the local communities, serve as an essential element of road infrastructure, and provide valuable ecosystem services.

Unique for Russia, in Kaliningrad region, the avenues are an important and recognizable feature of region’s landscape that belongs to history and nature of the area. They are an integral element of regional identity that connects past and present generations living on this land. Presently, Kaliningrad avenues have no legal protection and are exposed to destruction by regional authorities.

The project will study, adopt and implement skills and expertise of the Nordic countries, Baltic States, and Poland in the field of the avenues protection and regulation to help to develop a legal avenue protection base as well as give Kaliningrad activists necessary cross-border support and mobilize awareness rising cultural, social, and planting initiatives. The project will strengthen cultural landscape protection and build the capacity of NGOs in countries involved.

The project application will be submitted to the NGO Support Program of the Nordic Council of Ministers. The deadline for submissions is October 15, 2017. The program does not require co-financing by the project partners. Only nongovernmental organizations are eligible as project partners under the program.

More information about the project:

Partner search letter from Ecodefense

Project summary from Ecodefense

The Government of the Kaliningrad Regions invites all relevant stakeholders to participate in 7th International Forum of the Kaliningrad Partner Regions to be held in Kaliningrad on June 6-8, 2017 at the conference hall of Radisson Hotel. The opening session will start at 10.00 a.m. on June 7. (more…)

The 19th World Festival of Youth and Students / #WFYS2017 is to be held on October 14-22, 2017, in Sochi, Russia.

The main goals of the Festival: consolidating the international youth community around the idea of peace, solidarity and social justice, strengthening international youth ties, as well as promoting international and intercultural youth cooperation.

More than 20 000 young people from 150 countries aged between 18 and 35 years will participate in the 19th Festival. Among them are leaders of youth nonprofit organizations and political parties, young journalists, creative and sporting youth, young professors and scientists, leaders of student self-government, as well as young compatriots abroad and foreigners who study Russian language and are interested in Russian culture. Russia will host more than 8 000 foreign participants!

Furthermore, the Festival for the first time will go beyond one city! So, for participants is provided the regional program, during which foreign participants will be able to visit several Russian cities, such as St. Petersburg, Kaliningrad, Yekaterinburg, Vladivostok, Sevastopol/Simferopol

You can apply for participation in the event and follow the latest news on the website russia2017.com. Deadline for submitting applications for participation in the Festival: May 15, 2017. For all participants it will be necessary to pass the Skype interview with the Festival organizers after passing pre-selection stage.

For the participants of the Festival will be provided a special, simplified visa regime (visa application for the participant of the Festival will be free) to enter the territory of the Russian Federation.

The meeting in Kaliningrad Russia on 24-25 November 2016 was the next important stage of work on the project CaSYPoT-Ru – Capacity Building for Strategic Youth Policy and Transnational Cooperation. At the meeting discussions on important issues were held and significant solutions concerning the project were developed. (more…)

The CASYPOT project kicked-off in Emmaboda, Sweden on 20-21 September 2016. The project aims at cross-border network for developing strategic knowledge-based youth policies. (more…)

On 28th June 2016 Polish and Russian negotiators approved the Programme Document of the new Poland-Russia CBC Programme. The final draft was sent to the European Commission for the approval. (more…)

The 2007-2013 South Baltic Cross-border Cooperation Programme (SBP) was one of the most important cooperation tools for Euroregion Baltic as it  included most of the territories of ERB located in Lithuania, Denmark, Poland and Sweden. Being one of the European Territorial Cooperation programmes however, it did not include areas located outside EU thereby preventing partners from the Kaliningrad Region from participating in SBP projects on equal basis and with direct financial support from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). Nevertheless, organisations located in Kaliningrad could still take part in the SBP projects as Associated Partners thereby participating in project activities and develop cross-border cooperation links with relevant partners from other regions of the South Baltic area. (more…)