EUDIGIT partners mark a productive project launch

EU Commissioner Mariya Gabriel wished them a successful implementation and expressed her commitment to working with the innovative cities part of the network

The European partnership under EUDIGIT – European Digital Citizens kickstarted with an open virtual conference last week. On 7 October, project partners from France, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Romania presented the partnership to the public and shared their common goals – to help reduce the digital divide in their cities and explore innovative ways to promote digital citizenship.

Innovative cities promoting digital citizenship

EUDIGIT is a European partnership between six EU cities: Marseille (FR), Rotterdam (NL), Genoa (IT), Varna (BG), Hamburg (DE), Cluj-Napoca (RO) and TheMayor.EU – The European Portal for Cities and Citizens. For the next two years, these partners will work on achieving the following ambitious objectives:

• Strengthening EU citizenship and citizens' awareness of it;
• Contributing to bridging the digital gap in cities;
• Co-building digital policies with citizens.

More, about the ways to achieve these goals and the actors involved, was said at the kick-off meeting, hosted by the City of Marseille, which gathered participants and audience in front of their screens on 7 October 2020. Representatives of the municipal administration, the European Commission and the academic and NGO sectors took active part in the event.

They discussed the achievements of the European digital policy so far and its perspectives beyond 2020; the digital society and single market and how to better develop digital services at the local level. If you are curious to learn what happened at the opening event, head over to Facebook and follow the video recording.

EUDIGIT aligns with the European agenda for digital education

Mariya Gabriel, EU Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth congratulated the partners on the project launch. In her official address sent to the project team, she underlined the need to act against some alarming trends. She pointed out to the fact that more than one in five young people fail to reach a basic level of digital skills across the EU.

Gabriel expressed her appreciation with the innovative approach of the EUDIGIT project to reducing the digital divide via policies and evolution of public services tailored 'with and for all citizens'. She was positive that EUDIGIT will achieve its goals and underlined how important it is to further build on their results and complement them with other initiatives to maximize the impact.

Finally, the goals of the EUDIGIT partnership fall perfectly in line with the new Digital Education Action Plan that Gabriel launched on 30 September and which will foster a high performing digital education ecosystem and enhance digital skills and competences.

“As the first EU Commissioner in charge of the three elements of the knowledge triangle education, research and innovation, I am committed to work with innovative cities like the ones in your consortium, to ensure that the digital and innovation divides are reduced for the development of a well-integrated innovation ecosystem in Europe”, she wrote. Read the full greeting statement of Commissioner Gabriel here.

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