The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development is an international financial institution founded in 1991. As a multilateral developmental investment bank, the EBRD uses investment as a tool to build market economies.
The European Investment Bank (EIB) is the European Union's investment bank and is owned by the 27 member states. It is the largest multilateral financial institution in the world. The EIB finances and invests both through equity and debt solutions companies and projects that achieve the policy aims of the European Union through loans, equity and guarantees.
The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the agricultural policy of the European Commission. It implements a system of agricultural subsidies and other programmes. It was introduced in 1962 and has since then undergone several changes to reduce the EEC budget cost and consider rural development in its aims. It has however, been criticised on the grounds of its cost, its environmental, and humanitarian effects.
The U.S. Economic Development Administration (EDA) is an agency in the United States Department of Commerce that provides grants and technical assistance to economically distressed communities in order to generate new employment, help retain existing jobs and stimulate industrial and commercial growth through a variety of investment programs. EDA works with boards and communities across the country on economic development strategies.
The Cotonou Agreement is a treaty between the European Union and the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States. It was signed in June 2000 in Cotonou, Benin's largest city, by 78 ACP countries and the then fifteen Member States of the European Union. It entered into force in 2003 and was subsequently revised in 2005 and 2010.
The Tuchola Forest, also known as Tuchola Pinewoods or Tuchola Conifer Woods, is a large forest complex near the town of Tuchola in northern Poland. It lies between the Brda and Wda rivers, within the Gdańsk Pomerania region. The largest towns in the area are Czersk and Tuchola.
The Regional Policy of the European Union (EU), also referred as Cohesion Policy, is a policy with the stated aim of improving the economic well-being of regions in the European Union and also to avoid regional disparities. More than one third of the EU's budget is devoted to this policy, which aims to remove economic, social and territorial disparities across the EU, restructure declining industrial areas and diversify rural areas which have declining agriculture. In doing so, EU regional policy is geared towards making regions more competitive, fostering economic growth and creating new jobs. The policy also has a role to play in wider challenges for the future, including climate change, energy supply and globalisation.
The European Structural and Investment Funds are financial tools governed by a common rulebook, set up to implement the regional policy of the European Union, as well as the structural policy pillars of the Common Agricultural Policy and the Common Fisheries Policy. They aim to reduce regional disparities in income, wealth and opportunities. Europe's poorer regions receive most of the support, but all European regions are eligible for funding under the policy's various funds and programmes. The current framework is set for a period of seven years, from 2021 to 2027.
The European Social Fund Plus (ESF+) is one of the European Structural and Investment Funds (ESIFs), which are dedicated to improving social cohesion and economic well-being across the regions of the Union. The funds are redistributive financial instruments that support cohesion within Europe by concentrating spending on the less-developed regions.
Interreg is a series of programmes to stimulate cooperation between regions in and out of the European Union (EU), funded by the European Regional Development Fund. The first Interreg started in 1989. Interreg IV covered the period 2007–2013. Interreg V (2014–2020) covers all 27 EU member states, the EFTA countries, six accession countries and 18 neighbouring countries. It has a budget of EUR 10.1 billion, which represents 2.8% of the total of the European Cohesion Policy budget. Since the non EU countries don't pay EU membership fee, they contribute directly to Interreg, not through ERDF.
Drinking water and sanitation in Nicaragua are provided by a national public utility in urban areas and water committees in rural areas. Despite relatively high levels of investment, access to drinking water in urban areas has barely kept up with population growth, access to urban sanitation has actually declined and service quality remains poor. However, a substantial increase in access to water supply and sanitation has been reached in rural areas.
Water supply and sanitation in Indonesia is characterized by poor levels of access and service quality. More than 16 million people lack access to an at least basic water source and almost 33 million of the country's 275 million population has no access to at least basic sanitation. Only about 2% of people have access to sewerage in urban areas; this is one of the lowest in the world among middle-income countries. Water pollution is widespread on Bali and Java. Women in Jakarta report spending US$11 per month on boiling water, implying a significant burden for the poor.
EQUAL was a Community Initiative within the European Social Fund of the European Union. It concerned “transnational co-operation to promote new means of combating all forms of discrimination and inequalities in connection with the labour market”. It ran from 2001 till 2007 with a budget of some €3 billion of EU resources, matched by a similar sum from national resources.
Water supply and sanitation in Senegal is characterized by a relatively-high level of access compared to most of sub-Saharan Africa. A public–private partnership (PPP) has operated in Senegal since 1996, with Senegalaise des Eaux the private partner. SDE does not own the water system, but manages it on a 10-year lease from the Senegalese government. Between 1996 and 2014, water sales doubled to 131 million cubic meters per year; the number of household connections increased by 165 percent, to over 638,000. According to the World Bank, "The Senegal case is regarded as a model of public-private partnership in sub-Saharan Africa". A national sanitation company is in charge of sewerage, wastewater treatment and stormwater drainage, which is modeled on the national sanitation company of Tunisia and is unique in sub-Saharan Africa.
Water supply and sanitation in Tanzania is characterised by: decreasing access to at least basic water sources in the 2000s, steady access to some form of sanitation, intermittent water supply and generally low quality of service. Many utilities are barely able to cover their operation and maintenance costs through revenues due to low tariffs and poor efficiency. There are significant regional differences and the best performing utilities are Arusha and Tanga.
European Union–Pakistan relations are the international relations between the common foreign policy and trade relations of the European Union and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. There has been no EU State Leader's visit for over twenty years.
Water supply and sanitation in Burkina Faso are characterized by high access to water supply in urban areas, while access to an at least basic water sources in rural areas – where three quarters of the population live – remains relatively low. An estimated one third of water facilities in rural areas are out of service because of a lack of maintenance. Access to at least basic sanitation lags significantly behind access to water supply.
Although access to water supply and sanitation in sub-Saharan Africa has been steadily improving over the last two decades, the region still lags behind all other developing regions. Access to improved water supply had increased from 49% in 1990 to 68% in 2015, while access to improved sanitation had only risen from 28% to 31% in that same period. Sub-Saharan Africa did not meet the Millennium Development Goals of halving the share of the population without access to safe drinking water and sanitation between 1990 and 2015. There still exists large disparities among sub-Saharan African countries, and between the urban and rural areas.
Cross-border cooperation is the collaboration between adjacent areas across borders. In the European Union this is one of the forms of territorial cooperation. The European model is very diverse with cooperation between border regions or municipalities, or through specific cooperation structures. These structures are usually composed by public authorities from different countries organized in working communities, euroregions or EGTCs.
Brownfields are defined by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as properties that are complicated by the potential presence of pollutants or otherwise hazardous substances. The pollutants such as heavy metals, polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB), poly- and per-fluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) contaminating these sites are typically due to commercial or industrial work that was previously done on the land. This includes locations such as abandoned gas stations, laundromats, factories, and mills. By a process called land revitalization, these once polluted sites can be remediated into locations that can be utilized by the public.
