Services of General Interest in a Nordic Context

Hjalti Jóhannesson, University of Akureyri Research CentreESPON on the Road final seminar, Vilnius 11 November 2014

1. The Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden – Lead Partner

2. University of Vienna (UNIVIE), Austria

3. Federal Institute for Research on Building, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR), Germany

4. Centre of Geographical Studies (CEG), University of Lisbon, Portugal

5. University of Akureyri (UNAK), Iceland

6. Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research (NIBR), Norway

7. Institute of Geography and Spatial Organization (IGSO), Polish Academy of Science, Poland

8. PlanIdea, Hungary

9. Academy of Economic Studies in Bucharest, Research Centre for Macroeconomic and Regional Forecasting (PROMAR), Romania

10. Territorial Observatory of Navarra (NASURSA), Spain

11. University of West of England (UWE) United Kingdom

SeGI - Indicators and Perspectives for Services of General Interest in Territorial Cohesion and Development (2010 – 2013)

• The concept „Services of General Interest“ is rather loosely defined and has its roots in EU politics and governance: • “The debate on services of general interest suffers from a lack

of clarity on terminology. The concepts are used interchangeably and inaccurately. Stakeholders have asked the Commission to provide clarity. In doing so, however, the Commission is bound by EU primary law and the Court's case-law. Moreover, the concepts are dynamic and evolve.” (European Commission 2011)

• In fact, a mixture of infrastructure and diverse services provided by public and private bodies

SGI – Services of General Interest?

The aim of the SeGI project

Address the need for support for policy making, at all levels and of all types of territories, for effective delivery of SGI throughout Europe

Identify gaps that exist in territorial evidence to support implementation, monitoring and

evaluation of territorial policy measures for SGI

1 Definitions and key concepts

2 Data and maps

3 Indicator appraisal and review

4 Case studies

5 Typologies

6 Governance and policy aspects

7 Scenarios

8 Suggestions for future research

Work Activities

5

• SSGI: Social Services of General Interest• Social security, employment and training

services, social housing, child care, long-term care and social assistance services

• SGEI: Services of General Economic Interest• Telecommunications/electronic communications,

postal services, electricity, gas, transport• Other services of general economic interest

• Waste management, water supply, public service broadcasting

Classification of SGIs

Status of SGIs in

Europe (NUTS 2)

Atlas of SGIs compiled and published under the lead of BBSR in Bonn

Certain similarities among nordic countries/regions

See here: http://www.bbsr.bund.de/BBSR/DE/Veroeffentlichungen/Sonderveroeffentlichungen/2013/DL_Atlas.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=2

• Description/analysis of the state of SGIs in the region• Statistics• Survey among the municipalities• Expert interviews

• General informants (public administrators/ policy makers/ academia representatives, key-users, representatives of business sector)

• Practitioners involved in delivering SGI

• Two in Nordic locations• Northern-Iceland • Finnmark in Norway

Case studies

AgendaGeneral findings – Case: northern Iceland

AgendaAccess to services: scale 1-5local public administration

health centrepharmacy

hospitalsocial care

kindergarden/pre-schoolprimary school

secondary schooltertiary school/university

bank, basic financial servicespost service

personal and household servicesculture centres

librarylarge shopslocal roadsmain roads

railwayselectricity network

water supply networksewage systems

waste disposalgas supply

telehopne networkmobile phone

Internet

4.84.74.7

4.34.7

4.84.9

4.54.1

4.94.7

4.64.3

4.84.0

4.74.3

4.74.6

4.54.8

4.94.3

3.8

AgendaQuality of technical infrastructure: scale 1-5

local roads

main roads

railways

electricity network

water supply network

sewage systems

waste disposal

gas supply

telehopne network

mobile phone

Internet

4.1

3.8

4.5

4.2

4.4

4.5

4.8

4.3

3.8

AgendaQuality of social services: scale 1-5local public administration

health centre

pharmacy

hospital

social care

kindergarden/pre-school

primary school

secondary school

tertiary school/university

bank, basic financial services

post service

personal and household services

culture centres

library

large shops

4.4

4.5

4.6

4.8

4.6

4.8

4.8

4.8

4.6

4.8

4.8

4.7

4.7

4.8

4.5

Agenda

1. Difficult to fund services after the crisis, demands have not decreased2. Privatization of services and use of market solutions has had more

negative impact in remote areas 3. Some services tend to be increasingly centralized4. Cooperation of municipalities on service provision and related issues is

be fragmented5. Personal connections seem to influence how things are carried out in

small communities6. Equality between individuals regarding service provision believed to be

relatively high7. Some communities tend to compete with larger municipalities in order to

provide similar services without really being capable of doing so

Interviews: Some interesting comments

Agenda1. Financing of services – cutbacks tend to be worse in peripheral locations2. How to economize without damaging the services?3. More complex technology and equipment, impacts the location of

specialized services – more centrality (e.g. hospital service)4. Hard to recruit and maintain staff with specialized education and/or

qualifications to settle in peripheral locations (e.g. health staff)5. Fewer inhabitants in peripheral locations – increasingly difficult to

provide services – costly and time consuming to seek services in core locations

Interviews: Examples of challenges facing services

AgendaThank you!