At the launch of the Northern Periphery Programme, 2007-13 held in Aviemore on 20-21 February 2008, John Bachtler gave a keynote presentation on 'Overcoming the barriers to transnational cooperation'.
Drawing on a range of academic and policy research, the presentation examined the strengths and weaknesses of INTERREG transnational cooperation programmes in the 1994-99 and 2000-06 periods, as well as the results of recent evaluations of the NPP. It also considered some of the strategic and operational challenges facing the NPP in the 2007-13 period, particularly the pressure for greater added value and organisational learning.
EPRC has been heavily involved in the development of the new NPP programme, undertaking both the mid-term evaluation update of the 2000-06 programme and the ex ante appraisal and strategic environment assessment of the 2007-13 programme. Together with Nordregio, EPRC has also undertaken research on the role of learning in transnational cooperation programmes including the NPP available here, and it has an undertaken EU-wide meta-analysis of the 2000-06 mid-term evaluations for the INTERACT secretariat available here. A copy of John Bachtler's Aviemore presentation is available here.