Sustainable Regional Development in the Arctic

The Nordic Working Group has initiated the project Foresight Analysis for Sustainable Regional Development in the Nordic Arctic. The purpose of the project is to assess opportunities and challenges for sustainable regional development in the Nordic Arctic and to identify future development perspectives. The project will provide more comprehensive knowledge, and input for development of the Nordic Arctic policy.

The foresight analysis is carried out in three stages, where communities, regions and national authorities contribute with their perspectives on the potentials and challenges for the future, through a series of workshops on sustainable regional development in the Nordic Arctic. The Foresight analysis report was successfully launched with prominent panelists and presentations in Copenhagen 30 January (more here) .

Foresight analysis is a method that is used in the development of local economic and social development strategies, based on a structured dialogue between relevant actors and with input from local, regional and national actors. The objective of this process is to cre­ate a foundation for action, focusing on the opportunities that become evident from the analyses.

The Working Group places emphasis on identifying the opportunities and challenges for business development and the perspectives of young people on their own future opportunities in the Nordic Arctic.

The Nordic Working Group for Sustainable Regional Development in the Arctic has defined three key questions for this foresight analysis:

1. What social and resource conditions – both natural and human-related – can be expected to have a decisive influence on regional development in the Arctic over the next ten, twenty, and thirty years?
2. How will the management of these conditions affect the living standards and future prospects for the regions?
3. What are the implications of the identified challenges for future planning and regional policy?