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Word from the President
Now at the end of 2009, ERSA can look back to yet another year of successful activities. The 49th European Congress of the Regional Science Association International (RSAI) in Lodz was from what I have heard (I couldn’t participate due to serious illness in the family) a success from an organizational point of view. We all thank the Polish LOC for all their efforts to make the congress a success and we also thank the University of Lodz for hosting the congress. The Lodz congress was the first test of ERSA’s new congress software that except for some minor problems functioned well. A new and improved version of the software will be used for the 2010 congress.
During 2009 an ERSA summer school was organized in Volos in Greece – a summer school that was very much appreciated by the participants. WE thank the Volos team for their contribution to ERSA.
Overall the experiences from 2009 clearly illustrate the advantages of developing ERSA into a professional scientific organization. And still, the management of ERSA has not operated with full capacity during 2009 due to Marie Hervo’s maternity leave and serious sickness in the president’s family. Despite this, substantial progress have been made during 2009 in the management routines of ERSA including new accounting routines and in collaboration with RSAI and the European Investment Bank (EIB) beyond the EIB-ERSA prize in regional science. There have also been important developments in terms of long-term planning. It is already decided that the 2011 European Congress will be held in Barcelona and the 2012 European Congress in Bratislava. Some preliminary contacts have also been taken to find a suitable location for the 2013 European Congress. We have also got a proposal from the University of Luxembourg to host an ERSA summer School in 2011. We all have strong reasons to thank Marie Hervo and Caroline Theodor at the ERSA office in Louvain-la-Neuve for all their efforts to serve ERSA, the sections and the members.
For 2010 the ambition is to make substantial progress on ERSA’s “business plan” as well as to deepen the collaboration with the sections. Not least is the ambition to encourage sections that have not hosted a European congress and/or an ERSA summer school to plan for hosting such events. Another concrete ambition is to develop and strengthen cooperation with EIB and other European Institutions. Due to cooperation with EIB and with the Center for Transport Studies (CTS) at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and Jönköping International Business School (JIBS) it will be possible to organize an ERSA summer school on “The Evaluation and Financing of Infrastructure Investments” in Sweden in August 2010. The summer school will end at the same day as the 50th Congress of RSAI starts, i.e., on the 19th of August, which implies that the participants in the summer school will have an option to continue directly with the congress.
The 2010 European Congress of RSAI is hosted jointly by the Nordic Section of RSAI and JIBS. As far as I have heard from the chairman of the local organising committee – professor Hans Westlund – the preparations are running smoothly and I believe that all participants in will notice that the 2010 European Congress is a 50 years anniversary for the European Congress in terms of both the scientific and the social program.
I hope to see you all in at the 50th European Congress of RSAI in Jönköping, Sweden, in August next year!
Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year
Charlie Karlsson
Professor and President of ERSA
