Promoting economic cooperation in the European Arctic
The Arctic Investment Platform (AIP) project promotes economic cooperation in the sparsely populated areas of the North (NSPA). NSPA consists of the seven regions in eastern and northern Finland, the four northernmost regions in Sweden and the three northernmost counties in Norway. Since January 2019, the Regional Council of Lapland has coordinated an Interreg Nord project in close cooperation with BusinessOulu, Region Norrbotten, Region Västerbotten and Norinnova AS with the aim of further strengthening the administrative cooperation in NSPA.
The project will create a feasibility study, including an analysis of investment needs and potential in NSPA. In addition, a proposal for a funding model and support system to be implemented. If the study concludes that it will be possible to set up an investment platform, the project will also develop a roadmap, presenting the necessary resources needed to establish such a platform.
Improved use of existing networks
The project was launched early this year with a workshop in Rovaniemi, where it was agreed that the collaboration should focus on the investment needs of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) with growth potential. It was also agreed that future investment cases, to be funded through the Arctic Investment Platform, should be within digitalization and Arctic natural resources.
A survey on mapping the needs and potential of financial cooperation was sent to SMEs and financial institutions and investors in NSPA in June. The purpose of the survey is to get information about the investment needs of small and medium-sized businesses, and on the other hand, the expectations of financial institutions and investors given the different financial instruments available.
The relevance of the European Arctic to the EU has gained visibility in recent years. At the same time, Eastern and Northern Finland, together with NSPA, have taken concrete steps towards more visible cooperation in Brussels. All of this has helped to generate a lot of interest in the financial cooperation, both within NSPA and beyond, including at the highest level of the European Commission.
A close collaboration with the European Investment Bank (EIB) was established early on in the project, which has ultimately led to a cooperation agreement in August 2019. Under the agreement the EIB will provide its professional services to the project for the rest of this year, free of charge, with the option to continue the contract in 2020 depending on the results of the feasibility study. Already during the spring, the project has been able to utilize EIB expertise in the development of the surveys.
How will the collaboration continue to evolve?
The aggregated results of the survey sent to small and medium-sized companies and investors will be compiled early this fall. In connection with this, a survey to clusters, incubators and business incubators in NSPA will be conducted, with the aim of filling in potential gaps or question marks in previous surveys.
A workshop aimed at financial experts to review the results of the survey will be held in September. The regions will provide input to the preliminary results in October, through a steering group meeting in Umeå and a more operational reference group meeting in Brussels.
The final report, compiled from the survey, feedback from regional representatives and experts, as well as interviews, will be finalized by the end of November. Before the report is finalized, the
The reference group could give final feedback on the content and agree on a way forward in 2020, based on the results and the proposed roadmap.
