16th Plenary Session of the Congress – Strasbourg (France)

5 March 2009

Message by Nicusor-Daniel Constantinescu, President of the Black Sea Euroregion

presented by Ludmila Sfirloaga, President of the Congress Chambers of Regions

Dear Mr. President,

Dear members of the Congress,

Ladies and gentlemen,

Allow me to thank the Congress for the invitation to attend its plenary session and particularly for the constant support it provides to the Black Sea Euroregion and to cooperation in this area. This debate, organized during the plenary session of the Congress, gives us the possibility of promoting our young association, its objectives and priorities.

The common will to create an institutional basis  for cooperation in the Black Sea area has found substance in establishing the Black Sea Euroregion on the 26th of September 2008, in Varna, Bulgaria. At that time, besides the Congress, an honorary member of the BSER, 14 founding members of this structure have signed the constituent documents, determined to turn the Black Sea area into a forum for cooperation among local and regional authorities in order to improve development in all fields.

Last year, in November, Constanta County Council hosted the 1st General Assembly of the Black Sea Euroregion that adopted several important decisions for its future activities on short and medium term, the standing committees were set up, and priority projects for 2009 were discussed and approved.

Between 25-26 March 2009, Varna Municipality will be the host of the 2nd General Assembly of our association that will focus on one of the major issues that the Black Sea communities are confronted with, that is the energy efficiency.

As agreed in the BSER Statutes, the objectives of our association are:

-               establish relations between the inhabitants of the Black Sea area with a view to developing cross-border co-operation initiatives;

-               protect the members’ common interests and define a common development strategy;

-               disseminate information on members’ relevant experiences and know-how to all BSER members;

-               elaborate joint programmes and development strategies and set up actions aimed at implementing them;

-               create the necessary conditions for developing social and economic activities while protecting the environment and taking into consideration the need to improve the territorial cohesion among its members;

-               identify intervention needs, joint projects and funding sources applicable to BSER members;

-               organize, set up and implement joint transnational co-operation projects eligible for financial support from national, European and other international institutions;

-               support public-private partnership initiatives;

-               support the civil society.

These objectives are the starting point of the projects proposed by Constanta County Council that holds the Presidency of the Black Sea Euroregion. All those projects aim at increasing local development in the Black Sea area and are meant to generate benefits for our communities.

In a more and more globalized society, we cannot remain indiferent to the changes around us and what affects or influences local development in Romania today, may affect or influence local development in the other Black Sea countries and the reverse.

The concept of UNITY by DIVERSITY may be the solution to many of our daily confrontations and cross-border cooperation that we are going to develop through the Black Sea Euroregion will be the key element of this concept.

Besides other cross-border infrastructure projects implemented in our county, our main goal is to develop „The Black Sea Cruise”, an integrated project that includes several projects oriented to the development of tourist and social-cultural infrastructure in the Black Sea basin. Besides the Danube-connected cruise which is the main objective of this project, its goal is to turn all the ports along its itinerary, from destination ports into home ports that would provide specific entertainment and cultural activities including:

-               building of Black Sea marinas;

-               building of Danube tourist ports;

-               improvement of tourist services by opening a ferry-boat line between Romania-Bulgaria, that is Constanta-Varna-Burgas, possibly extended to Odessa and Istanbul

-               building a traditional Black Sea village – a series of restaurants with specific Black Sea dishes (Constanta House, Varna House, Odessa House, Sochi House, Samsun House etc.) and small museums of the Black Sea countries.

-               Black Sea cultural traditions, a project aiming at making a complete presentation of Black Sea local and regional authorities  and organizing a folk music festival to be entitled „Black Sea Music”;

-               Black Sea culinary menu, a project aiming at drawing up a joint Black Sea menu that would contain specific dishes for each Black Sea community and would be available in every harbour-city of the Basin and also organizing a culinary festival;

This is an overview of the projects we want to start through the Black Sea Euroregion, accessing available funds for the Black Sea area, that is, ENPI, Black Sea Synergy, Interreg IVC, SEE etc. and for additional information, we invite you to visit our website: www.bser.eu.

I make the mention that by the kindness of the Congress, the Black Sea Euroregion has benefited from a presentation stand and I hope you visited it along the works of the plenary session. 

 

I hope the information on the Black Sea Euroregion has managed to meet your interest and in your quality as high representatives of your countries in the Congress, you will support our association to develop and become a strong voice and a more solid framework for cooperation and development. These two words: “cooperation” and “development” may be balancing factors for the difficulties that the world of today faces, in the context of crisis.

Thank you!