Waltzing Matilda

Guest blog from Tony Lockett of DG Regio on using online tools and social media to colloborate and communicate across the regions.

Look beyond Brussels, and you’ll see that the European Union is more than European Council summits, the Berlaymont building and the bars of Place Lux.

Whether you live in Andalucia or the Aland Islands, it’s often at the regional and local level that EU policies and funding make a real difference to people’s lives.

But how can we get the word out about what’s getting done, and share our experiences and good practices with other regions across Europe?

This blog post looks at some of the ways that we are trying to use social media and online tools to promote networking and collaboration between Europe’s regions.

We’d love to receive your comments and suggestions!

© Ministerium für Arbeit, Soziales, Frauen und Familie (Land Brandenburg)

EU regional policy

Regional funding accounts for one third of the European Union’s budget.  The policy is designed to help less developed regions to catch up, as well as promoting economic growth and competitiveness across the EU.

Support is provided for hundreds of thousands of projects each year in a wide range of areas, including transport, environment, energy, training, business support, research and innovation.

EU regional policy is delivered through a system of “shared management”.  This means that national and regional authorities have an important role to play in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of funding programmes.

For more information on how this works, have a look at the EU regional policy website

Communicating regional policy

We have three main communication objectives for 2012:

1. Highlighting the impact of EU regional funding, particularly by shining a spotlight on good projects (eg. through our annual ‘RegioStars‘ awards).
2. Showing how EU regional policy is helping to support the Europe 2020 targets for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.
3. Explaining the changes that the Commission has proposed for the next funding period in 2014-2020.

Our key target audiences include:

With our sector and our networks:

1. national and regional authorities who manage EU funding
2. regional development agencies and project partners
3. Other EU, national and regional officials
4. NGOs and social partners

With a wider reach:

1. journalists working for EU, national and regional media
2. the academic and research community
3. members of the wider public with an interest in how EU regional policy is making a difference in their region.

In line with the principle of “shared management”, the Commission works closely with the managing authorities responsible for EU regional funding programmes, as well as the Commission’s Representations and networks like Europe Direct.

For more on this, check out the Information and Communication Plan 2012 (Regional Policy)

In other words, EU regional policy involves a large number of actors at the European, national and regional level who need to be in communication with each other, and online tools provided a potential way to do this.

Online collaboration

In order to provide new opportunities for cooperation online, the Commission launched a Drupal-based platform called RegioNetwork 2020 in October 2010.

The features offered by the site include:

1. Creation of a profile on behalf of a region or as an individual.
2. Creation of a groups, discussion forums, wikis etc.
3. Sharing and rating good practice examples.
4. Sharing photos and videos.
5. Opinion polls.
6. Webchats (we have organised several with Commissioner Hahn).

One year after the launch of the site, RegioNetwork now brings together over 2000 registered users from all EU countries.  Progress has been encouraging, but there have been a number of challenges, which we are hoping to address in a new version of the site that will be launched in Spring 2012:

1. Usability of the site and performance issues
2. Identifying and developing tools that people really need to collaborate online
3. Changing habits and stimulating interaction

Social media

Our key target audiences are increasingly using social media, particularly Twitter, to publicise their work, discuss issues relating to EU regional policy and connect with people who have similar interests.

The @EU_Regional Twitter account has allowed us to join these conversations, learn more about what people are thinking and saying, share information and make some interesting new connections.

We have also been using the European Commission’s Facebook page to share videos and images that tell great stories about EU-funded projects, including the winners of our annual RegioStars competition.

Our Flickr account has also provided a place for us to share photos, particularly around big events like the European Week of Cities and Regions that takes place each year in October.

Looking ahead to 2012

Here are some of the things that we hope to implement and improve in 2012:

1. Launch a new version of the RegioNetwork 2020 site, taking into account feedback from users on their needs and interests
2. Work with the Commission’s Representations, as well as the INFORM network of communication officers in managing authorities, to share information about EU-funded projects via social media in specific countries and languages.
3. Work with the finalists and winners in our annual RegioStars awards to use social media to promote their projects.
4. Share images of events and projects on Flickr, as well as the Commission’s Facebook page.  Encourage more user-generated content (maybe a photo competition …).
5. Reach out to bloggers (particularly those who are active at the national and regional level, since EU regional policy does not seem to be a priority for most of the Eurobloggers …).
6. Test different social media monitoring tools so that we can improve the way we measure the impact of our activities, as well as gain intelligence about what people are saying on social media about issues related to EU regional policy.

So, what do you think?  Let us know what more we could be doing to use social media and online tools to connect Europe’s regions!

Tony Lockett @TonyLbxl

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