GROW RUP is an Interreg Europe project that brings together five outermost regions of the EU. GROW RUP supports the creation and growth of innovative companies in the field of green and blue economy, with a particular focus on long-term unemployed people in the ORs.
The outermost regions (OR) have to face a series of difficulties related to their geographical characteristics, such as remoteness, insularity, small size, climate, which have generally acted as a restriction in their development. In addition to these structural characteristics, the economic crisis that Europe has suffered in recent years has further compromised its economic growth.
GROW RUP fits into this framework in two ways:
1. Boost the competitiveness and entrepreneurship of SMEs and focus their attention on long-term unemployed people in the ORs
2. Supporting green and blue growth in order to offer more sustainable and resource efficient economic activities in those territories
The project will allow partner organizations to exchange experiences, practices and ideas among themselves, as well as with relevant stakeholders, and thus find solutions to improve their regional approaches.
A key element of the project is visits to interregional sites, where project partners share strategies and experiences on specific topics and brainstorm with policy makers and stakeholders to select a set of best practices.
After visits to interregional sites, the partner regions organize workshops for the organization's staff and local stakeholders to present the results of site visits, validate selected best practices and develop guidelines for the drafting of action plans.
The GROW RUP learning process takes place during 2017-2019, after which the findings are collected, analyzed and compiled into regional action plans and the GROW RUP compendium.
In 2019-2021, GROW RUP will move from learning to implementation. The regional action plans are put into practice and their progress monitored closely. The recommendations and results of the project will be widely disseminated to the other ORs that do not participate as partners in the project, as well as to other regions of the EU to give them the opportunity to take and replicate the lessons learned.