To some degree, metropolitan regions owe their existence to the ability to valorize agglomeration economies. The general perception is that agglomeration economies increase with city size, which is why economists tend to propagate urbanization, in this case in the form of metropolization. Contrarily, spatial planners traditionally emphasize the negative consequences of urban growth in terms of liveability, environmental quality, and congestion. Polycentric development models have been proposed as a specific form of metropolization that allow for both agglomeration economies and higher levels of liveability and sustainability. This paper addresses the challenge of how such polycentric development can be achieved in planning practice. We introduce ‘agglomeration potential maps’ that visualize potential locations in a polycentric metropolitan area where positive agglomeration externalities can be optimized. These maps are utilized in the process of developing a new spatial vision for Flanders’ polycentric ‘metropolitan core area’, commonly known as the Flemish Diamond. The spatial vision aspires to determine where predicted future population growth in the metropolitan core area could best be located, while both optimizing positive agglomeration externalities and maintaining its small-scale morphological character. Based on a literature review of optimum urban-size thresholds and our agglomeration potential maps, we document how such maps contributed to developing this spatial vision for the Flemish metropolitan core area.

What can we learn from each other and others? Since the mid-eighties the Nordic countries have received a high influx of refugees relative to the population size. Currently these countries receive large numbers of refugees, notably from the Middle East. Existing studies exploiting the rich administrative registers in the Nordic countries have shown that the speed of labour market assimilation of immigrants from non-Western countries in the Nordic welfare states is slow. However, few studies distinguish between refugees and non-refugee immigrants from Non-Western countries.

Contents

• Foreword by Anna Piil Damm and Olof Åslund

1. Immigrant labor market integration across admission classes (Bernt Bratsberg, Oddbjørn Raaum, and Knut Røed)
2. Labour market integration of refugees in Denmark (Marie Louise Schultz-Nielsen)
3. Labor market integration of refugees in Finland (Matti Sarvimäki)
4. Labour market entry of non-labour migrants – Swedish evidence (Olof Åslund, Anders Forslund, and Linus Liljeberg)
5. The School Achievements of Refugee Children: Lessons from Sweden (Hans Grönqvist and Susan Niknami)
6. Does reduced cash benefit worsen educational outcomes of refugee children? (Kristian Thor Jakobsen, Nicolai Kaarsen, and Kristine Vasiljeva)
7. The fiscal impact of refugee immigration (Joakim Ruist)

This comprehensive report delves into the economic policy responses of the Nordic countries amidst the tumultuous period marked by the COVID-19 pandemic, the subsequent recovery phase, the energy crisis, and inflation spanning from 2020 to 2023. It provides a critical examination of the macroeconomic strategies employed during these challenging times, highlighting the lessons learned and the effectiveness of different policies. 

The report raises pivotal questions regarding the outcomes of these policies, their impact on the Nordic economies, and the lessons that these countries can glean from each other's experiences.

Key Findings and Highlights:

• Fiscal Support Measures: The report evaluates the unprecedented fiscal support measures implemented by the Nordic countries during the pandemic. It discusses how these measures, while stabilizing the economies, resulted in overgenerous subsidies to firms, indicating areas for future refinement.
• Job Retention Schemes: An analysis of job retention schemes reveals their critical role in preserving employment during the pandemic. The report suggests that while effective, these schemes should be designed to avoid hindering necessary structural changes within the economies.
• Fiscal Policy Challenges: The need for fiscal policies that can stabilize the business cycle, provide household income loss insurance, allow for public investment, and address the needs of an ageing population is emphasized. It argues for debt financing beyond current limits to meet urgent investment needs.
• Energy Crisis and Green Transition: The energy crisis is examined as a case study in balancing immediate relief with long-term sustainability goals. The report discusses the importance of allowing price mechanisms to encourage the green transition while providing timely support to consumers and businesses.

Overall the report underscores the importance of policy adaptability, advocating for economic policies that can swiftly respond to unforeseen crises without compromising long-term fiscal sustainability. It calls for targeted support measures that aid vulnerable households and firms during economic downturns without impeding structural adjustments. Furthermore, it emphasizes the necessity for adequate resources towards active labour market policies, including vocational training and subsidized employment.

Facing intricate trade-offs between maintaining robust economic policy frameworks and adapting to new challenges, the Nordic countries stand at a crossroads. The report advocates for a vibrant exchange of policy insights and impacts, stressing the need for adaptable, targeted, and well-resourced economic policies.

This report is essential reading for policymakers, economists, and anyone interested in the complexities of economic policy-making in the face of multiple crises. It offers a thorough analysis of the Nordic experience, providing valuable lessons for both the region and beyond.

The contributions document how income inequality in the Nordics in various dimensions have increased over recent decades. These developments are put in an international context. Developments in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden are compared. Important aspects analysed in detail are overall inequality of both market and disposable incomes, the redistribution through the tax and transfer system as well as through the provision of government welfare services, the importance of demographic factors, the developments of both relative poverty and top income shares, and gender inequality.

Today, the Nordic region comprises over 27 million people and is the 10th largesteconomy in the world by GDP. The individual countries are ranked high ondigitalization and characterized by high productivity. A common trend across Nordiccountries is rising healthcare expenditure linked with an aging population andincreasing amounts of chronic illnesses and mental health issues. Besides the largeannual toll and productivity loss because of diseases, the Nordic region spent over4160 billion EUR on healthcare in 2020.

To accommodate the radical changes indemography, Nordic Innovation has set a vision that the Nordic region will be “themost sustainable and integrated health region in the world, providing the bestpossible personalized health care for all its citizens” by 2030. In this report, weexamine the opportunities for the Nordic region to leverage health data to realizethis vision and attempt to evaluate the potential economic effects of the realizedvision.

Even if we achieve the vision by 2030, we do not foresee the immediaterealization of the full value potential of health data. Rather, our analysis andmodeling show we can expect a time lag of a few years before the value realizationwill have a significant effect on the Nordic economies. Because of this, the estimatedeconomic benefits in this report present the values for the year 2040, but it is worthstressing that to see these effects as outlined in this report, there is a need toimplement changes as soon as possible, before 2030. Some effects will materializeearlier than 2040, assuming that the implementation is done by 2030.

The last few years have seen a lot of activity within the Nordic mining industry. New mines have opened, but there have also been cases of bankruptcies. Heightened activity has in turn led to discussions on the role of legislation and taxation in ensuring that mining contributes to sustainable development. At the same time, a number of voluntary sustainability initiatives have appeared.

For historic reasons, the Nordic countries share a lot of similarities with regards to legislation. And not least with regards to environmental laws, the EU has contributed to further harmonisation, even among the non-member states Iceland and Norway. Yet important differences exist. Legal revisions are sometimes the result of much-publicised problems, so experiences in each country plays an important role.

An overview of taxation also indicates both similarities and differences.

Promoting green transition and building greener economies is currently high on the policy agenda in the Nordic countries. But how can we make it happen in practice? To answer this question, Nordregio went directly to those working with green growth at the regional level. We asked them about the main challenges that impede green growth in Nordic regions, and sought their ideas about potential ways to overcome these challenges and drive the green transition forward. These responses were then combined with the findings from a national policy review to inform a detailed analysis of the state of play, practices and needs of Nordic regions with respect to promoting green growth. This policy brief presents the findings of this analysis along with recommendations designed to support regional policy makers in their work towards a greener economy.

This issue of Nordregio News focuses on innovation and governance. What are the key issues in innovation policies and how should they be considered in governance? We view this from different perspectives, with a common focus on the interests of people, their institutions and the knowledge they bring to the table.

Projektaktiviteterne under Nordisk Ministerråd er omfattende, og projekt- og programlignende aktiviteter udgør over halvdelen af budgettet. Nordisk Råds Kontrolkomite har på den baggrund igangsat en udredning af udvalgte projekters gennemførelse og effekt. Udredningen omfatter projekter inden for miljø- samt social- og sundhedsområdet (afsluttet i perioden 2011-2013). Udredningen har særlig fokus på a) projekternes nordiske nytteeffekt, b) eventuel politisk opfølgning og c) hvordan resultaterne og de positive effekter er gjort synlige og tilgængelige for offentligheden.

Pohjoismaiden ministerineuvoston projektitoiminta on mittavaa, ja projekti- ja ohjelmatoiminnan osuus budjetista on yli puolet. Pohjoismaiden neuvoston tarkastuskomitea on käynnistänyt tämän nojalla selvityksen tarkastelun kohteeksi valittujen hankkeiden toteutuksesta ja vaikutuksesta. Selvityksen kohteeksi on valittu ympäristöalan sekä sosiaali- ja terveysalan hankkeita (jotka ovat päättyneet kaudella 2011–2013).

The objectives of this study were to identify the innovation-oriented challenges as well as areas with high growth potential within the Nordic bioeconomy. The study produced background data concerning the volume and constituents of bioeconomy in the Nordic countries using NACE codes. According to the estimate, the total turnover of the key bioeconomy sectors in Nordic countries is roughly 184 000 M€, this is 10% of the total economy. Key findings from the business ecosystem analysis show that market access is the key step to successful bioeconomy innovation, along with end user involvement and utilization of existing infrastructure. Areas within bio-based chemicals, biomaterials, biofules and bioenergy, biorefineries, resource-efficiency and industrial symbiosis and services based on ecosystem services havehigh innovation and growth potential of bioeconomy.

The obstacles of innovation in Nordic bioeconomy are lack of capital and funding, unstable operating environment due to changing regulation, market access and lack of number of actors involved in the ecosystems. Areas for further development to better tackle the identified obstacles include networking and developing a common understanding of the roles of different stakeholders, making processes for seeking support and financing easier for SMEs and promoting cross-sector transfer of existing or new applications for existing processes. Venture capitalists should be included in the networks to ensure they are better able to recognize the potential of commercial viable bioeconomy concepts. More focus may also be needed to link the support to finding commercially viable applications with the markets and customers.

This paper explores the challenge of finding common ground between the Finns and the Chinese in the context of co-operation, trade and inward investment facilitation related to general lack of specific interest displayed by the Chinese. The article is ethnographic in nature and is mainly based on data obtained from interviewing individuals working for local governments in Finland and one of the state agencies responsible for attracting foreign investment. The study uses Speech Codes Theory (Philipsen, 1997) when analyzing the cultural aspects of expectations regarding communication between Chinese and Finns. According to interviewees, lack of serious interest, vague government guidelines, the longer time needed to build relationship, and involvement of intermediaries all contribute to the difficulty to move the discussions to a more specific level of focus. Finnish expectations regarding this type of communication are that it should be direct and task-oriented, because they feel pressure to yield real results quickly and efficiently. Suggested strategies to make the co-operation talks more specific are presenting the expertise areas of Finland, clarification regarding too general terms used by the Chinese, and investing into building personal relationships with them.

This report is the first out of four reports of the project “Ensuring inclusiveeconomic growth in the transition to a green economy (EnIGG)”. The EnIGGproject is a cross-sectoral project initiated and financed by the Nordic Council ofMinisters and coordinated by Nordregio. It aims to increase knowledge on how tostrengthen the Nordic economies in a challenging context and accelerate thegreen transition towards a climate-neutral economy while ensuring that theseprocesses are inclusive.The research for this report was conducted by researchers from VictoriaUniversity (Australia), Merit Economics (Finland) and Nordregio, withcontributions from the Centre for Regional & Tourism Research (Denmark) andReykjavik University (Iceland). The report analyses the impact of selected climatepolicy measures on Nordic economies, industries, and households.

This Policy Brief summarises key messages from a webinar series hosted by the Integrating climate in macroeconomic modelling (ICMM) project during the second half of 2022 and the first half of 2023. In the wake of recent climate policy discussions at the EU, Nordic and national levels, the webinars were meant to promote the advancement of expert and policy-planning knowledge and at the creation of networks among model developers and model users from different Nordic countries. The main goal of this project is to foster discussions regarding modelling approaches and to identify future Nordic and international opportunities for collaboration at both expert and policy-planning levels.

A Nordic co-operation on tax information exchange agreements with offshore financial centres.

The Nordic Model is a well-established concept in the world. It explains, for example, the successes of the Nordic countries in recent times, not least in various economic terms. But how does the model work in these times of globalisation, and does it have a future? Here, the consequences of digitalisation, globalisation and the ageing population are described, and proposals presented for what needs to be reformed in the Nordic countries to ensure that the model has a future.

Ett nordiskt samarbete om ingående av informationsutbytesavtal på skatteområdet med finansiella offshorecentra

The Nordic Economic Policy Review – NEPR – is published by the Nordic Council of Ministers. This year’s issue is part of the Danish presidency programme for the Nordic Council of Ministers in 2015. The review addresses policy issues in a way that is useful for in-formed non-specialists as well as for professional economists. All articles are commissioned from leading professional economists and are subject to peer review prior to publication.

The review appears once a year. It is published electronically on the website of the Nordic Council of Ministers: www.norden.org/en. On that website, you can also order paper copies of the Review (enter the name of the Review in the search field, and you will find all the information you need).

Årsrapporten for Nordisk Ministerråd for 2013 aflægges i to dele. Årsregnskabet indeholder Nordisk Ministerråds årsregnskab og udvalgte hoved- og nøgletal. Endvidere indeholder årsregnskabet Rigsrevisionens beretning og påtegning. Herudover indeholder årsrapporten ledelsens beretning, som følger op på de større prioriterede temaer i Nordisk Ministerråds budget 2013.

Generalsekretærens budsjettforslag for 2016

Budsjettforslaget bygger på innspill fra fagministerrådene. Budsjettet innebærer også at det er satt av midler til nye politiske initiativer, samtidig som det viderefører prioriterte satsinger fra 2015. I tillegg er det gitt rom for nye politiske prioriteringer fra formannskapet for 2016, Finland. Forslaget bygger på rammer og retningslinjer vedtatt av samarbeidsministrene.

Det nordiske regjeringssamarbeidet gjennomgår for tiden en omfattende moderniseringsreform. Budsjettet for 2016 er både i form og innhold i stor grad preget av dette. Innretningen og oppbyggingen av budsjettboken er videre utviklet fra 2015 med intensjonen om å presentere et budsjett med tydelige målformuleringer og konkrete resultater. Innholdet i budsjettet viser et dynamisk politisk samarbeid som fanger opp aktuelle og nye prioriteringer.  

Budsjettet bygger på budsjettanvisningene som samarbeidsministrene vedtok tidligere i år. Videre er budsjettet basert på innspill fra de 10 fagministerrådene. Budsjettet for 2016 har en samlet reduksjon på 1 % i forhold til budsjettet for 2015. Denne reduksjonen er fordelt på de to største sektorene, nemlig samarbeidsministrenes eget budsjett samt utdannings- og forskningssektoren med henholdsvis 70 og 30 % av reduksjonen. Gjennom målrettede prioriteringer har disse to sektorene selv fordelt reduksjonene på sine respektive budsjetter. Alle de øvrige sektorer får videreført sine budsjetter på samme nivå som i 2015. 

Planer og budget 2015 - sammenfatning

The Nordic countries are currently facing major challenges with regard to maintaining and further developing social welfare. Against this background, the Nordic Council of Ministers decided in autumn 2013 to appoint a working group to map initiatives to support social entrepreneurship and social innovation in the Nordic countries. The main purpose of this mapping is to increase knowledge of initiatives to support social entrepreneurship and social innovation in the Nordic Region in the work to include disadvantaged groups in employment and society. This report presents the results from the mapping and the working group's recommendations for further follow-up.

Toimintasuunnitelma ja budjetti 2015 – tiivistelmä

Verkefna- og fjárhagsáætlun 2015 – samantekt

Pohjoismainen yhteistyö verotietojen vaihtosopimusten solmimiseksi offshore-rahoituskeskusten kanssa

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