RaiSE participates in Europe, Let's Cooperate! in Brussels
RaiSE & SOCIAL SEEDS were together in the policy change exhibition on 10 April 2019.
Anders Bro (Region Örebro County) and Paula Santarén (ACCIÓ) were RaiSE representatives at the fifth interregional cooperation forum organised by Interreg Europe. The event gathered together more than 500 participants in the Wild Gallery (Brussels) on the 10 & 11 April 2019. Both Anders and Paula were very happy to participate and share learnings and inspirations with other Interreg Europe projects.
Keep on reading to discover Anders and Paula's journey during this great event...
Paula & Anders, sitting in front of RaiSE poster, just before starting their participation in the Policy Change Exhibition
Anders Bro, special guest at Interreg Europe's online programme
Our Swedish and very proactive partner Anders Bro was selected for an interview at Interreg Europe's online programme, which was live broadcasted on 10 April 2019. Luckily, the very interesting ten minute interview is also available online and you cannot miss it! Anders explains many things, such as the role of social enterprises in Sweden, the learnings from RaiSE project partners that are inspiring Örebro, and the policy changes that have already been reported under RaiSE project. Watch the interview HERE:
The interview to Anders is between minute 13 & minute 23
Paula Santarén was also interviewed during the event. She was asked about RaiSE impact so far in general, the role of social enterprises in Catalonia, the draft Catalan Action Plan for RaiSE and RaiSE victory at Interact's Project Slam (we will share this interview too as soon as it is available online).
Policy change exhibition: we are stronger when we cooperate together
RaiSE was invited by Interreg Europe programme to participate in the Policy Change Exhibition, to talk about RaiSE achievements and the difference that the project is making in partnering regions. When arriving at the stand, Anders & Paula prepared RaiSE roll-up and leaflets and got ready to explain RaiSE to the audience. But, in that journey, they were not alone: they were extremely happy to discover that the "sister" project of RaiSE, SOCIAL SEEDS, was precisely at the neighbour stand. Both projects have cooperated several times in the past, organising joint events and helping each other to solve similar problems, and will continue doing so in the future, demonstrating that we are stronger when we cooperate together, which is finally the essence of Interreg Europe projects.
The cheerful representatives of the "sister" projects RaiSE & SOCIAL SEEDS, from left to right: Anders Bro (Örebro), Paula Santarén (ACCIÓ), Esteban Pelayo (EURADA), Tessa Anné (EURADA) and Giacomo Frisanco (EURADA)
Conclusions of the event
We appreciated very much the different plenary conferences, particularly the one about how to ensure a successful Phase 2, as our project is about to start that phase and not much guidance about it had been provided so far. The document that Interreg Europe has recently launched will be very useful for us for a properly design of Phase 2.
Once more, we think that the most valuable output of the event were the networking opportunities that arose during the two days of the event. Particularly, the Policy Change Exhibition on the 10th afternoon and the small working groups at the Exchange of Experience Workshop on the 11th morning were useful to realise that all projects face the same problems and that cooperation is key to success and "raise" all our projects.
