User:Chilling T/Greater Region of Luxembourg

This article deals with the Greater Region of Luxembourg explaining its structure and the related cooperation and projects. The cooperation area was created to promote the economic, cultural, touristic and social development of the region.

Geography
The Greater Region of Luxembourg is composed of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, Wallonia, Saarland, Lorraine, Rhineland-Palatinate and the German speaking community of Belgium presenting a total area of 65.401 km², spreading more than 400 km from East to West and more than 350 km from North to South. Northern Wallonia and the Rhine valley are part of the same mountain ridge, which forms a natural border in the North/North-East of the Greater Region. In this area, the numerous large cities as well as the high density of population and transport networks influence the spatial structuring in an important way. In opposition to this, in its south, the Greater Region is connected to a diagonal of only little population density and economic dynamism, proceeding from the center of Spain to the eastern plains of the Paris Basin. Inbetween these two regions, the cross-border region SAAR-LOR-LUX constitutes an industrial core area with many urban agglomeration areas in the geometric center of the Greater Region. Within this asymmetric area, the densely populated axes of the big valleys (Moselle, Saar) and the extensive transport network, connecting this central region across the highlands with the outlying regions of the Rhine, constitute important elements of continuity and simultaneously essential windows towards the neighboring regions.

Demography
The first January 2008, the Greater Region of Luxembourg was inhabited by 11,359,815 persons which are distributed in a very unbalanced way over the 5 sub regions. More than half of the population lives in Rhineland-Palatinate and in Wallonia. Only 4,26 % of the total population lives in Luxembourg which constitutes the smallest sub region.



For 2030, a very slight decrease of the total population of the Greater Region is forecasted. However, there are important differences in the projected population evolution across the composing sub regions. Thus, Luxembourg will be confronted with an important proportional increase of 0,25 %, while a decrease of 0,11 % is predicted for the German sub region Saarland.

Economy
The Greater Region of Luxembourg is characterized by the very high number of 164,000 daily commuters with 132,000 of them working in Luxembourg (2007/08). Due to the drastic changes of the industrial and coal mining areas in the 4 countries, the common economic problems have lead to the creation of a community of interest and to the development of common projects like the European Pole of Development in the cross-border area of Longwy (France), Rodange (Luxembourg) and Athus (Belgium).

The European center situated between the rivers of Sarre, Moselle and Meuse presents the highest number and density of cross-border commuters in the European Union. More than half of them are originate in Lorraine and almost three-quarter of them (73,4 %) work in Luxembourg. Thus, these two regions play a very important role in the dynanism of the cross-border labour market. The Grand Duchy and the Saarland are both characterized by a positive cross-border commuter balance. However, Luxembourg regularly presents high positive balances while the positive balance is continously diminishing in the Saarland. The other subregions have more out-commuters than in-commuters. The Lorraine provides the highest number of workers for the benefit of the neighbouring regions (-89 478 persons).





Culture
After 20 years, the Greater Region of Luxembourg was the first area including 4 countries and 5 regions with 3 different languages, which was selected as the European Capital of Culture. The sub regions respectively selected one focal theme:

- Luxemburg: Migration

- Rhineland-Palatinate: Important European personalities

- Saarland: Industry as cultural heritage

- Lorraine: Culture and memorization

- Wallonia: Ausdruckformen der Moderne

The 28th of April 2008, the "association Espace culturel Grande Région" (association cultural Space Greater Region) was created in 2007 when the Greater Region constituted the European Capital of Culture. Its goals are the pursuit and the conservation of the cultural cross-border cooperation. The main principle of the association is to bring cultural authorities of the Greater Region together and to define a common work program.

The work program of the "Espace culturel Grande Région" is based on the following axes:

- conduct a reflection on the cultural strategy of the Greater Region

- develop and conduct the cultural and cross-border projects culturels

- develop and professionalize the networks of competencies

- encourage mobility in the Greater Region

- développer des passerelles liant la culture à l’éducation et à d’autres champs d’action.

Partners of the association "Espace culturel Grande Région":

- in Lorraine

Directorate General of the departments Moselle, Meuse and Meurthe-et-Moselle Regional Directorate of cultural affairs of Lorraine Region Lorraine

- in Luxembourg

Ministry of culture of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg

City of Luxembourg

- in Rhineland-Palatinate

Miniistry of education, science, youth and culture Rhineland-Palatinate

City of Trier

- in Saarland

Ministry of Culture of the Saarland

- in Wallonia

Ministry of the French Community of Belgium Ministry of the German Speaking Community of Belgium

The association is a project cofinanced by the European Fonds of Regional Development in the framework of the INTERREG IV A program Greater Region.

Interregional cooperation
Interregional observatory of the labour market

Interregional parliamentary council

Network of mediators

EuRegio SaarLorLux +

e-BIRD

Cooperation of development

Interregional council of the Chamber of Crafts Saar-Lor-Lux

Association 'Espace culturel Grande Région'(Cultural Space Greater region)

Association of the museums of the Greater Region

Cultural portal of the Greater Region plurio.net

Musical cooperation of the Greater Region

Chorus Robert Schuman

1, 2, 3 GO

Secondary school germano-luxembourgeois Schengen-Perl

Charter of universitarian cooperation

University of the Greater Region

Interregional press

TIMIS flood

Statistical offices

Interregional syndicate council

Interregional syndicate 'des Trois Frontières' (three borders)

Syndicalistic platform of the Greater Region

cross-border Eures

Quattropole

European level of cooperation
INTERREG IV A Grande Région