Within this first call for proposal, 68 applications were received, as set out in the chart on the right, from the 5 Members States participating on the Atlantic Area Programme. The applications were submitted across all priorities defined within this Programme, focused on Innovation, Environment, Accessibility and Sustainable Urban Development. Following a thorough analysis, the Monitoring Committee approved 24 projects: 8 in Priority 1; 8 in Priority 2; 3 in Priority 3; and 5 projects in Priority 4. The total amount of ERDF for these 24 projects is €39.5m, distributed as set out in the table below.

Priority 1: PROMOTE TRANSNATIONAL ENTREPRENEURIAL AND INNOVATION NETWORKS

ATLANT-KIS

The overall goal is to enhance the Knowledge and Technology Transfer and innovation processes on SMEs through the promotion and co-operation of Knowledge Intensive Services (KIS) at the Atlantic Area.
Lead Partner: Departamento de Innovación, Empresa y Empleo, Gobierno de Navarra, SP
Partners: SP(2), FR(1), IE(3), PT(1), UK(1)
Total Cost: 2.363.666 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.536.381 €

ATVENTURE

Aims to improve Venture Capital markets in regions outside main financial centers and their use and contribution to Research & Development activities.
Lead Partner: Centro Europeo de Empresas e Innovación del Principado de Asturias, SP
Partners: SP(4), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1)
Total Cost: 1.367.149 €
Allocated ERDF: 888.646,85 € 

AUXNAVALIA

The general objective is to improve competitiveness of the marine shipbuilding ancillary services industry, by implementing resources and activities that improve their innovation capacity.
Lead Partner: Fundación para o Fomento da Calidade Industrial e o Desenvolvimento Tecnolóxico de Galicia, SP
Partners: SP(2), PT(2), UK(2)
Total Cost: 1.601.191 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.040.774,15 €

WINATLANTIC

The goal of this project is to help redirect the economies of regions in the Atlantic Area and develop their endogenous regional potential, by implementing an action to stimulate the internationalization of Innovative Start-ups and SMEs (ISS) in these territories.
Lead Partner: Ouest Atlantic (FR)
Partners: SP(2), FR(4), IE(2), PT(3), UK(1)
Total Cost: 2.949.019 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.916.862 €

CANTATA2

Focus on tourism development, connecting SMEs and exploring networks in order to exploit local potential and improve competitiveness.
It seeks innovative ways of developing products, training and marketing and routes to market. Real and genuine local tourism experiences, ‘slow tourism’.
Lead Partner: Denbighshire County Council, UK
Partners: SP(1), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1), UK(1)
Total Cost: 2.279.984 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.481.989 €

NEA2

Aims to develop a cutting-edge watersports sector within the AA, which differs from what is done in this domain in the international arena by its exemplary implementation, by delivering: economic innovation and performance, protection and development of the environment, quality of life and social cohesion.
Lead Partner: Conseil Régional de Bretagne, FR
Partners: SP(7), FR(8), IE(2), PT(3), UK(3)
Total Cost: 4.721.137 €
Allocated ERDF: 3.068.737 €

ATCLUSTERS

The main objective is to explore real possibilities of transnational cooperation among clusters in the Atlantic Area (existing or under creation ones), and in connecting them together in order to facilitate their development at EU and international level.
Lead Partner: Instituto Gallego de Promoción Económica (IGAPE), SP
Partners: SP(3), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1)
Total Cost: 1.161.042 €
Allocated ERDF: 754.677,15 €

RETHE

The Rethinking Entrepreneurship project sets out to create in the Atlantic Area a network of organizations involved in promoting entrepreneurship, which will contribute to lowering the existing differential with other more dynamic parts of the EU and to adopt a new model of entrepreneurship with which it will be possible to provide new support services and tools for entrepreneurs and start-ups.
Lead Partner: LAN EKINTZA-BILBAO,S.A,SP
Partners: SP(2), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1), UK(1)
Total Cost: 1.930.446 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.254.790 €

Priority 2: PROTECT, SECURE & ENHANCE THE MARINE AND COASTAL ENVIRONMENT SUSTAINABILITY

ARCOPOL

Aims to improve prevention, response and mitigation capabilities against oil, HNS (Convention on the Carriage of Noxious and Hazardous Substances by Sea) and inert spills and to establish the basis for a sustainable Atlantic network of experts.
Lead Partner: Centro Tecnológico del Mar-Fundación (CETMAR), SP
Partners: SP(5), FR(3), IE(1), PT(2), UK(1)
Total Cost: 3.072.233 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.996.931,80 €

PRESPO

This project is expected to improve the current management policy of shared fishery resources in the Atlantic Area exploited by the artisanal fleet through the development of alternative instruments in the framework of the integrated management of coastal fisheries.
Lead Partner: Instituto Nacional de Recursos Biológicos (IPIMAR), PT
Partners: SP(6), FR(3), PT(2)
Total Cost: 3.671.186,5 €
Allocated ERDF: 2.386.219,34 €

ATLANTOX

Advanced Test about New Toxins appeared in the Atlantic Area, has a main objective to support and accelerate the development and introduction of a proper and efficient method of fast alternative controlling based on antibodies and functional test for biotoxins.
Lead Partner: Universidad Santiago de Compostela, SP
Partners: SP(2), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1), UK(2)
Total Cost: 1.839.463,37 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.195.651,18 €

EASYCO

Aims to build a Polycentric Infrastructure for Operational Ocean Modelling in the whole Atlantic Space (AS) joining capacities from all the 5 countries to forecast hydrodynamics and biogeochemistry (BGC) at the regional scale using grid sizes of a few km’s.
Lead Partner: Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), PT
Partners: SP(3), FR(3), IE(1), PT(2), UK(1)
Total Cost: 2.688.476 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.734.536 €

REINFFORCE

The purpose of this project is to pool the capacity of 12 institutes to face a transnational issue that is adaptation to climate change impacts on Atlantic forests. It will set up tools for monitoring climate change and its impact on the Atlantic coast and test the efficiency of adaptative measures.
Lead Partner: Institut Européen de la Forêt Cultivée (IEFC), FR
Partners: SP(4), FR(4), PT(1), UK(1)
Total Cost: 3.932.849,5 €
Allocated ERDF: 2.556.352,01 €

MAREN

The aims of this project are: to optimise the energy extraction potential and minimise the hydro-environmental impact of a wide range of the most promising marine renewable energy devices. Much of this work will apply to sites all along the
European Atlantic coast region and world-wide.
Lead Partner: Cardiff UniversitY, UK
Partners: SP(1), FR(1), IE(1), PT(1), UK(1)
Total Cost: 1.655.507,81 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.075.943,26 €

ANCORIM

Focuses on strengthening the operational capacity of decision-makers in Atlantic regions, with the aim of preventing coastal risks and in particular those linked to climate change.
Lead Partner: Conseil Régional d'Aquitaine, FR
Partners: SP(3), FR(6), IE(3), PT(3)
Total Cost: 1.891.752,01 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.228.110,89 €

BIOTECMAR

The overall aim is to help the companies of Atlantic Area (which are mainly SMEs) to take advantage of the use of modern biotechnological tools and contribute to a diversification of the activities derived from marine biomass exploitation within the strict framework of sustainable management of marine natural resources.
Lead Partner: Université Européenne de Bretagne - Université de Bretagne Occidentale (UEB-UBO ), FR
Partners: SP(2), FR(6), IE(2), PT(2)
Total Cost: 2.322.692 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.509.749,8 €

Priority 3: IMPROVE ACCESSIBILITY AND INTERNAL LINKS

START

This project addresses both the accessibility issue and the intensification of interregional relationships in relation to the transport of passengers, and the consortium is willing to take on the role as THE strategic project for Accessibility.
Lead Partner: Merseyside Passenger Transport Authority and Executive, UK
Partners: SP(1), FR(6), PT(4), UK(3)
Total Cost: 7.447.555,67 €
Allocated ERDF: 4.840.911,20 €

PROPOSSE

The overall objective of PROPOSSE is to promote short sea shipping as a real alternative to other means of transport of goods (like road) between SMEs from the
Interior and the ports of Aveiro, Gijón, Le Havre, Poole and Cork. This aim will be achieved by cooperation between ports and entities representing SMEs, and promoting regional development in regions outside the littoral.
Lead Partner: Autoridad Portuaria de Gijón, SP
Partners: SP(2), FR(1), IE(1), PT(2), UK(2)
Total Cost: 2.117.800 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.376.570 €

DURATINET

The main goal of the project is to create the network of excellence to facilitate an efficient exchange and transfer of knowledge, to promote the durability, safety and sustainability of transport infrastructures in the Atlantic Area, turning these regions more attractive to live in, to work and for competitive business.
Lead Partner: Laboratório Nacional de Engenharia Civil (LNEC), PT
Partners: SP(1), FR(5), IE(2), PT(4), UK(1)
Total Cost: 2.570.005 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.612.003 €

Priority 4: PROMOTE TRANSNATIONAL SYNERGIES IN SUSTAINABLE URBAN AND REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT

AAPUBLICSERV

The aim of this project is to develop longterm system of a transnational innovation and a Community able to establish an eadministration sustainable in the Atlantic Area.
Lead Partner: ERNACT EEIG, UK
Partners: SP(2), IE(2), UK(3)
Total Cost: 2.249.618 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.462.252 €

CRUISEATLANTICEUROPE

The project has as its main objective to strengthen the position of the Atlantic area in the European market of cruise tourism by the creation and promotion of new tourist products worldwide recognised by shipowners and shipping companies that, through the action of a network of ports, cities and regions, economically improve the specific dimensions of Atlantic culture and identity.
Lead Partner: Administração dos Portos do Douro e Leixões, S.A. (APDL), PT
Partners: ES(2), FR(1), IE(1), PT(2), UK(1)
Total Cost: 739.698 €
Allocated ERDF: 480.804 €

KNOW-CITIES

The aim of the project is to carry out a methodology to facilitate the access and transition to a knowledge economy, as a way to achieve cooperation on transnational issues related to common urban development as a factor of attraction and marketing in urban Atlantic Cities medium size.
Lead Partner: Ayuntamiento de Jerez, SP
Partners: SP(6), FR(4), IE(1), PT(2), UK(3)
Total Cost: 3.081.400 €
Allocated ERDF: 2.002.900 €

ULTREIA

The general objective of ULTREIA Project is to promote a cultural and religious sustainable tourism linked to maritime and land routes to Compostela. This promotion will be done through two important axes: the development of tourism Agenda 21 and the creation of an Atlantic regions network that develops tourism products inside a joint Atlantic cultural framework.
Lead Partner: Xunta de Galicia, SP
Partners: SP(2), FR(1), IE(1), PT(2)
Total Cost: 1.365.465 €
Allocated ERDF: 887.551 €

DORNA

The DORNA project is centred on development of the Atlantic regions included in it from a perspective of sustainable economic growth and cultural diversity, achieved by encouraging and diversifying traditional naval carpentry.
Lead Partner: Deputación Provincial da Coruña, SP
Partners: SP(3), PT(1), UK(2)
Total Cost: 1.941.269 €
Allocated ERDF: 1.261.822 €

THE SECOND CALL FOR PROJECTS IS PLANNED FOR THE FIRST QUARTER OF 2009

For more information about the programme see

Source: Atlantic Area Transnational Program

(04-02-09)