Supporting sustainability transitions through Cohesion for Transitions

Cohesion for Transitions is an initiative of DG REGIO that brings together public authorities and other stakeholders to support the absorption of EU funds for sustainability transitions. Through the initiative, five Ecorys offices contributed to the facilitation of the Working Groups and in the provision of technical assistance to four EU regions. The project ran from January 2023 to November 2024. Ecorys is leading the second phase of the initiative which launched in December 2024. 

The Cohesion for Transitions Community of Practice is an initiative under DG REGIO that emerged from the need to support managing and implementing authorities in accelerating their implementation sustainability investments under the European Regional Development Fund and Cohesion Fund Programmes related to Policy Objective 2 (PO2) ‘A greener, low-carbon transition towards a net zero carbon economy and resilient Europe’. The initiative aims to support regions in navigating the socio-economic and environmental challenges they are facing, and support their use of available funding to enhance resilience through their transitions, and is closely aligned with the ambitions set out under the European Green Deal. C4T brings together stakeholders to connect, collaborate, learn, and be supported in discussing and addressing bottlenecks and challenges related to their sustainability transitions.  

The Cohesion for Transitions (C4T) Community of Practice includes several cross-cutting pillars designed to be interlinked to ensure more cohesive and reinforcing support to stakeholders. These are: 

• Events to bring together the C4T community, including an annual conference bringing together experts and stakeholders to learn and share on topical issues, as well as Forum that focuses on exchanges and discussions between members of the community.  

• Tailored expertise and support is provided to regions to help them address specific issues in implementing sustainability transitions in their region, through C4T Groundwork.  

• An Academic Sounding Board, composed of a group of esteemed academics that develop a series of Knowledge Pieces on pressing thematic topics, as identified by the C4T community.  

• Three Working Groups on environment, energy, and climate that bring together Managing Authorities, intermediary bodies, and other relevant stakeholders to discuss, exchange, and share on bottlenecks and solutions implementing sustainability transitions investments.  

Key Findings 

Through collaboration with our regional offices in Spain, Italy, and Croatia, Ecorys provided technical assistance through C4T Groundwork to four beneficiaries: 

• Basque Country, Spain: support for the identification and analysis of successful transition strategies and good practices. 

• Sardinia, Italy: support in meeting Do No Significant Harm principle and climate proofing assessment. 

• City of Zagreb, Croatia: support to the development of infrastructure projects (climate proofing). 

• Île-de-France, France: regulatory developments support for circular economy and the impact on ERDF implementation.  

Each of these regions received expert support and advice tailored to their needs, priorities, and local context, to address a specific issue or challenging they were facing related to the implementation of Cohesion Policy investments supporting the European Green Deal. These technical assistance cases brought together Ecorys’ thematic expertise and knowledge of the local context and language, to provide needed and effective support to these regions.   

As lead of the C4T Working Groups, Ecorys oversaw regular discussions and dialogues between Working Group members, as they regularly exchanged on challenges and good practices throughout the project. A culmination of the work of the Working Groups is the Compendium of Good Practices, which is the result of guiding the members through a process of scoping, discussing, and drafting that was led by colleagues from Ecorys Brussels and Ecorys Netherlands.