Economic aspects of regional development policies
- Author(s):
- Parliamentary Assembly
- Origin
- See Doc. 3795, report of the Committee on Economic Affairs and Development. 1976. Text adopted by the Standing Committee, acting on behalf of the Assembly, on 28 June 1976.
- Thesaurus
The Assembly,
1. Recalling its
Resolution 544 (1973), on the repercussions of the economic and monetary union on regional development, and its
Recommendation 712 (1973), on the integration of immigrant workers with the society of their host countries ;
2. Reiterating that the development of backward regions in Europe cannot take place unless a proper balance is found between private investment and state intervention ;
3. Having taken note of Resolution (76) 26 of the Committee of Ministers, on the steps which can be taken to reduce the depopulation of rural regions, such as the attraction to those areas of manufacturing industry and the stimulation of tourist activities, which emphasises the important role to be played by local and regional authorities in this respect by providing the basic infrastructures required ;
4. Having taken note of the Galway Declaration, adopted at the first Convention of the Authorities of European Peripheral Regions, which emphasises that the gap between the peripheral and central regions of Europe is becoming greater, and that the concentration of population in the central regions is producing significant economic and social costs for the central regions as a result of congestion, but also for the peripheral regions themselves as a result of an under-utilisation of productive factors ;
5. Mindful of the specific difficulties of the semi-industrialised member states, notably Turkey and Greece, which are facing problems of overall economic growth coupled with regional and social disparities ;
6. Conscious of the repercussions that regional imbalances have on migrations, both national and international ;
7. Bearing in mind the guiding principles on migration adopted by the ministerial meeting of the OECD Manpower and Social Affairs Committee in March 1976, which provides, inter alia, that countries of emigration should design, in cooperation with the countries of immigration concerned, adequate institutional mechanisms in order to make emigration more useful as a contribution to development,
8. Stresses, in view of the difficulties resulting from the present economic situation for all European countries, the importance of finding an appropriate balance between, on the one hand, the promotion of the transfer of certain economic activities, in particular labour intensive industries, from immigration to emigration countries and, on the other, the initiation of industrial and rural development in emigration countries ;
9. Stresses the special role which the Council of Europe Resettlement Fund can play in facilitating the transfer of economic activities from immigration to emigration countries that are Fund members, in particular through the financing of infrastructures, labour intensive industries and vocational training centres ;
10. Calls on its members to take suitable action in their respective parliaments in order to press their governments :
to give appropriate priority to the development policies of backward regions, and to frame them in a coherent and systematic approach along the lines suggested by recent OECD studies, in particular in the "Reappraisal of regional policies in OECD countries" ;
to become members, if they have not yet done so, of the Council of Europe Resettlement Fund, with a view to strengthening its financial capacity ;
to implement as fully as possible the proposals formulated in Resolution (73) 3 of the Committee of Ministers on rural revival policies in a balance between town and country, and in Resolution (74) 7 on the economic and social problems of mountain regions ;
to develop further transfrontier co-operation between local authorities under bilateral agreements ;
11. Calls on the European Economic Community and its member states to work out proposals for the co-ordination of their regional development and planning policies with the other Council of Europe member countries in the framework of the European Conference of Ministers responsible for Regional Planning ;
12. Calls on the Council of Europe Resettlement Fund, the European Investment Bank and the World Bank to step up their efforts to finance in a co-ordinated way the transfer and/or establishment of economic activities and of the necessary infrastructure in the Council of Europe emigration countries with a view to reducing migratory flows.
