Eurocities calls for urban priority in cohesion policy

Eurocities called for specific guidelines focusing on cities and urban areas to be incorporated into the Community Strategic Guidelines (CSG) for Cohesion Policy.

This ´Fourth Priority´ should be aimed at 'Reinforcing the urban contribution to employment, social inclusion and sustainable development'. The Community Strategic Guidelines (CSG) set out the principles and priorities on which the future Structural Funds should be based. Currently, the European Commission is preparing a Communication on cohesion policy and cities.

The Communication will be based both on the Commission’s working paper ‘Cohesion policy and cities: the urban contribution to growth and jobs in the regions’ and on stakeholder responses to this document. The document fully acknowledges the role of cities as engines of economic development in Europe's regions. The Commission intents to incorporate the paper’s conclusions in the final version of the CSG. By incorporating these conclusions the urban dimension can be fully taken into account in the Structural Funds programmes covering the period 2007-2013.