Eure State of Play Regional Report Spain/Portugal
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EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL February 2021 Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL Pluriregional Operational Programme for Sustainable Growth 2014-2020 Spain Policy instrument addressed Plurirregional Operational Program for Sustainable Growth 2014-2020 Portugal North Portugal Regional Operational Programme Operational Programme Galicia 2014-2020 Partner involved in the state Eixo Atlántico do Noroeste Peninsular of play report writing Sent to the partnership February 2021 Publication date February 2021 This report reflects the author's views; the sole responsibility for the content of this deliverable lies with the authors. The programme authorities or the European Commission are not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained therein. Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL TABLE OF CONTENTS 1 | Recommendations 2 | Brief characterization of the project territory (Galicia-Norte Portugal) 01. Brief historical and social background of the area 02. Geographical data 03. Demography 04. Economy data 05. Specific characteristics. SWOT analysis 3 | Description of policy instruments addressed. ES+PT 01. Association Agreement between Spain and the European Commission. Pluriregional Operational Programme for Sustainable Growth 2014-2020 Spain 02. Association Agreement between Portugal and the European Commission, 28-07-14. Plurirregional Operational Program for Sustainable Growth 2014-2020 Portugal 03. Northern Portugal Regional Operational Programme 2020 04. Operational Programme Galicia 2014-2020 4 | Brief presentation of partner involved. 01. Eixo Atlântico do Noroeste Peninsular 5 | Brief characterization of the policy instrument addressed and other existing policy / strategic instruments 01. Description and main general characteristics of the Instrument 02. urban resource-efficiency a) Sustainable land use b) Water c) Waste d) Urban renewal e) Energy transition f) Sustainable Urban mobility Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL 03. Environmental management performance a) Air + Noise quality b) Climate adaptation c) Social inclusion d) Governance for sustainable urban development and Participation 04. Green growth and eco-innovation a) Green Growth and Eco-innovation 05. Analysis of how the policy instrument addresses the objectives of the Action Plan for the Circular Economy a) Regional Circular Economy strategies (if applicable) b) Inclusion of circular economy objectives in policy instruments Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL 1. Recommendations 1 Empower public and social participation in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of urban strategies and, in general, urban policy. The effectiveness of the participation of cities and their groups in the preparation and monitoring of the various European programmes at national level should be ensured, in particular those related to the new funding period and programmes of clear health to cities. And expressly in urban strategies. Further steps should be taken to strengthen the role of citizens and local actors in the development of sustainable urban developments and their strategies and throughout all phases of their implementation. This should be done on a dual scale: at the level of the urban area as a whole and at the level of the specific area where the actions are implemented, to involve the population of the neighborhood and agents of the area. It would be advisable to define the clear will to give knowledge of urban policy and what it means between the general population and the whole of society and not just among experts in the field. Only a society that knows this urban policy and its local strategies can sue them and demand that their rulers be executed and evolve. Despite the experience of the municipalities, such participation, on multiple occasions, comes down to collecting the information from the interest groups that they have previously available, but do not involve them when designing the strategies, as well as in later phases. 2 Promote an effective participation of small and medium-sized cities in urban policy to strengthen policentrism. The application of the ERDF's urban axis should be able to distinguish between these specific urban conditions, for example between medium/small cities and metropolitan areas, where solutions cannot be the same, nor the composition and integration of measures within a DUSI strategy. Some European territories such as the Galician and Northern Portuguese municipalities are populations less than 20,000 inhabitants and therefore do not qualify for the DUSI call for the period 2014-2020, so they have not been able to access European funding for urban strategies, but they are the headwaters of urban areas of more than 20,000 inhabitants formed by a system of dispersed and non-continuous or contiguous nuclei. 1 P A G E Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL It seems reasonable to take into account Galician casuistic population in small non-contiguous nuclei and to incorporate this reality into urban strategies and funding through ERDF funds by making eligibility possible for population centres which, on their own, do not reach the threshold of 20,000 haabitants, if they would exceed it if their rural sphere of influence were taken into account. Particularly relevant is the role they have as the headwaters of large rural areas and their importance in providing these areas with equipment, infrastructure and services that prevent the depopulation of these rural areas. This reality needs and therefore should not be left out of the process of making a strategy. 3 Integrated sustainable urban development should be progressively oriented to functional urban areas and polycentric urban systems, and to renewed forms of rural-urban cooperation based on agreements between and around urban centres with their surrounding areas. These "new" urban territories tend to share problems and should therefore tend to design and promote common urban development strategies, to the extent that sustainability will depend on this joint action in territories of variable and integrated scales. Small populations of less than 20,000 populations who are rural headwaters should be allowed to create a functional urban area or as part of a discontinuous multicenter network of centres to directly access European urban funding and national cohesion fund plans for urban policies. The new period and program should advance the incorporation of the concept of functional urban areas, with special attention to metropolitan ensembles, polycentrism of smaller cores and rururbans transitional spaces. Greater attention should be paid to the relationship of the city and the surrounding rural area. Rural-urban relations should be considered in the definition of urban areas for sustainable urban development policies. Urban expansion has led to the development of areas where urban and rural fabric are intermingled. Social and functional differences between life in cities, and rural surroundings, are becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish and draw a clear line between urban and rural areas. Urban and rural areas must cooperate to contribute to balanced territorial development. Mechanisms must be developed at all levels, normative, organizational, financial for the incorporation and development of new functional areas with the express participation of cities and municipalities. 2 P A G E Effectiveness of environmental Urban policies to improve Resources Efficiency EURE STATE OF PLAY REGIONAL REPORT SPAIN/PORTUGAL 4 Give greater relevance to strategic planning in the preparation of the programme instruments for the implementation of urban policy and european fund-rural and investment in general. The importance of integrated strategic planning in the field of sustainable urban development policies and the importance of developing urban agendas at all levels of administrations and governments or similar documents where this is not possible should be clearly expressed. New urban development programmes and local agendas should be aligned with UN's 2030 Agenda of its SDA, in particular Objective 11, and with the COP21 European Green Deal strategy and the Paris Pact, the European Pillar of Social Rights, the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy or the Sustainable Cities Reference Framework as well as other international reference documents. An effort must be made to make strategies more city-like and not a joint government. They should be the partial or total expression of a common and participatory pre-existing strategy, agreed collectivly, long-term and not a sum of conjunctural actions according to the government on duty. The strategy should be somewhat broader, not just the municipal administration and different from the financeable projects. The transition between the DUSI Strategies under way and the new generation of Urban Agendas will need to be made. The new urban strategies or agendas should be aligned with the European and Spanish Urban Agendas, their partnerships and the action plans already presented. 5 Promote the territorial and thematic grouping of local cities and