The EU-Japan Regional Cooperation Helpdesk launched this autumn by the EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation (a joint initiative of the European Commission DG GROW and the Japanese Government under METI) is a new regional cooperation platform mobilising European regions and clusters, Japanese Prefectures and clusters, that fully exploits the EU-Japan Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) and the EU-Japan Partnership on Sustainable Connectivity, signed by Prime Minister Abe and President Juncker in Brussels on 27 September 2019.

The EJRC Helpdesk will promote cooperation in terms of industry, trade, investment, innovation, tourism and people's mobility. Such cooperation will be bilateral between European and Japanese stakeholders, but it may also include the EU and Japan jointly operating vis-à-vis third countries, e.g. in Africa, South East Asia, EU's neighbouring countries, Latin America.

The EJRC Helpdesk will provide appropriate information (existing tools, funding, instruments) and will support regions, prefectures and clusters for finding European and Japanese partners to establish new cooperation and reinforcing the existing ones.

The helpdesk will give you the opportunity to highlight and share your best practices with Europe and Japan, and to connect you with the EU and Japan initiatives, which facilitate regional and business cooperation such as European Cluster Collaboration Platform, JETRO Regional Industry Tie-up, Enterprise Europe Network, Horizon 2020, and European Regional Networks.

The three offices of the EU-Japan Regional Cooperation Helpdesk are located in Strasbourg (Grand-Est Region, France – EU Office) and in the Gifu and Iwate Prefectures (Japan offices).

You can follow the activities of the EJRC Helpdesk on twitter @EJRCHelpdesk and the website (soon online at www.ejrc-help-desk.eu). Contact :

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SAVE THE DATE!

The first EU-Japan regional and cluster cooperation conference organised by the EU-Japan Regional Cooperation Helpdesk and the European Cluster Collaboration Platform (ECCP), with the support of the EU-Japan Centre for Industrial Cooperation and the European Commission DG GROW and DG REGIO, will take place in Strasbourg (France) on 27-29 April 2020.

During this 3-days event, the helpdesk with the ECCP will organise pitches and matchmaking between European regions, Japanese Prefectures and EU-Japan clusters. In addition, the conference will include an important dimension in line with the EU-Japan Connectivity Partnership by enabling EU and Japan regions, clusters and Prefectures to collaborate vis-à-vis their counterparts in third countries, e.g. in Africa and South East Asia.

The event organisers invite all regions and clusters (and network of clusters, and network of regions) in Europe and all Prefectures and clusters in Japan to contact the EJRC Helpdesk (Dr Virginie Fermaud ) to join the first conference of April 2020 in Strasbourg.

For the matchmaking sessions and the site visits, relevant contact details will be provided shortly on the ECCP website:

https://www.clustercollaboration.eu

Source: EU-JAPAN NEWS