Interreg North-West Europe 

Interreg North-West Europe (NWE) is  a European Territorial Cooperation programme aiming to support a balanced development across the area, making all regions more resilient, and contributing to a better quality of life and well-being of all NWE citizens.

Since the industrial revolution, the NWE area has been at the vanguard of industrialisation and economic development in Europe. However, this century of growth came at a cost:

• On the environment
• On people
• On territorial inequalities

To address these challenges our Programme supports NWE territories in leading  a sustainable and balanced development and in reducing disparities. Using its transnational cooperation expertise, the 2021-2027 Programme wants to jointly “promote a green, smart and just transition for all NWE territories with the aim to support a balanced development and make all regions more resilient”

To reach this objective the Interreg NWE programme will support transnational cooperation involving public and private stakeholders, university and research, and civil society organisations from the different regions involved in the NWE programme area.

In the 2021-2027 period, a total budget of over 310 million EUR is allocated to Interreg North -West Europe.

Interreg North-West Europe supports cooperation across borders in a large European area: North-West Europe. For that, we fund projects involving partners from at least 3 different countries with a joint approach to tackle common issues. The aim is to reduce the disparities among regions and cities across the whole area.

Transnational cooperation, known as Interreg B, allows for cooperation over larger transnational territories or around sea basins.

It involves national, regional and local programme partners in Member States, but also in some programmes, non EU countries (third countries such as Iceland or Lichtenstein), Enlargement and Neighbourhood partner countries, and OCTs (The Overseas Countries and Territories), with a view to achieving a higher degree of territorial integration. Transnational cooperation implemented by the outermost regions is subject to a separated strand.

Like all Interreg programmes, it aims at promoting better cooperation across countries within the designated regions to find efficient solutions to common territorial, economic and social challenges, which are too broad to be dealt with efficiently at a national level.

Interreg B supports a wide range of project investments related to innovation, the green and digital transition, accessibility, digitalisation, urban development, public sector innovation and interoperability, etc. The transnational programmes add an important extra European dimension to regional development, leading to agreed priorities and a coordinated strategic response within the countries in the programme area. In particular, the principles of shared ownership and cooperation on equal footing will remain at the core of the 2021-2027 cooperation programmes on the external borders of the European Union.

They particularly contribute to achieve the following goals:

• Innovation, especially networks of universities, research institutions, SMEs;
• Environment and climate change, especially sustainable green and blue economy, water resources, flood management;
• Digital connectivity and sustainable transport;
• Sustainable regional development, especially in terms of education, labour markets and cooperation;
• Cultural heritage and sustainable tourism development;
• Capacity building and governance;
• People-to-people actions and engagement.

Interreg VI B 2021-2027

With a budget of almost 1.5 billion EUR, the 14 transnational Co-operation programmes for 2021-2027 are boosting strategic cooperation actions on large scale territories in Europe and beyond.

Three of them are benefiting of a large IPA contribution, namely the programme Interreg IPA Adrion, Interreg Danube Region and Interreg Euro-Med. All of those programmes are allowing cooperation between EU Member States and IPA countries.