Greetings, Interreg community! ✨
My name is Kyriakos Kourtidis. I am a recent Master’s graduate in International and European Studies from Thessaloniki, Greece, and currently, I act as an Interreg IVY Reporter for the INTERREG Programme VI-A Romania-Bulgaria, based in Bucharest. My education has provided me with a solid theoretical understanding of the EU’s Economic, Social, and Territorial Cohesion Policy. Within this framework, having the intention to deepen my understanding and gain more experience in European Territorial Cooperation, I decided to join an Interreg Programme as an IVY Reporter.
About the Programme
The Interreg VI-A Romania-Bulgaria Programme supports the development of the cross-border areas, in Romania and Bulgaria by financing joint projects.
What is the Programme’s main goal?
The programme aims to enhance the cooperation between the two bordering countries, Romania and Bulgaria, with the goal to help the border areas overcome their similar development challenges.
Who benefits from it?
Under the Interreg Programme, people living in the border area between Romania and Bulgaria benefit from enhanced cross-border cooperation by working together on common challenges. This includes effective information exchange, improved accessibility across the frontier, flood prevention measures, risk management plans, preservation of natural assets 🌿, and tourism promotion, among other initiatives.
My activities as an IVY
As an Interreg IVY Reporter, I am hosted by the Managing Authority of the Interreg Romania-Bulgaria Programme together with another IVY, with whom we are based in the Ministry of Development, Public Works and Administration, in Bucharest.
As an IVY, my activities include:
(1) Designing creative campaigns on social media in order to improve the Programme’s visibility and to increase stakeholder’s engagement. Notably, we launched a communication campaign with weekly Facebook posts, aiming to inspire interested parties to send their project proposals under the “Call for Proposals – An Educated Region”. 🎓
(2) Writing articles for the website/social media related to the programme’s and projects events, as well as communicating other aspects of the programme implementation. 💻
(3) Supporting the preparation, organization and communication of the public consultations on the future of Cohesion Policy for Interreg Programmes, post 2027. One notable mention of such an activity would be the consultation session with students at the Law Faculty of Craiova ⚖. Our team comprising of two Managing Authority representatives and the two of us IVYs Reporters presented to the students the Interreg Programme, informed them about the cross-border area and collected their views for the future development of the border area. Last but not least, taking the opportunity of this event, we the IVYs presented the IVY initiative, shared our experience with the young students 👨🏻👩🏻 and encouraged them to similarly embrace the Interreg Volunteer Youth initiative.
(4) Taking part and supporting the Programme’s events. One very recent and relevant example of such an event was the kick-off meeting of the DISMAR project that took place in Ruse, Bulgaria. The DISMAR project is one of the strategic projects of the programme, which aims to enhance the safety of navigation and efficiency on the common Romanian-Bulgarian sector of the Danube River. 🌊 🚢
Don’t hesitate to follow the updates of the programme on Facebook, LinkedIn and the website. 
My two months experience as an IVY was complimented by my participation to the EUs Macro-Regional & Sea Basin Strategies Days, 2024, which took place in Brussels. In this event, I and other IVYs, acting as representatives of the initiative, presented to relevant stakeholders the possibility for them to host Interreg volunteers, as well.
Most importantly, Interreg IVY offered me the opportunity to gain ownership of EU policies and contribute to EU cooperation. In conclusion, if I may paraphrase the final remark of Commissioner Elisa Ferreira during the Macro-Regional Strategy Days: we, the European youth, adhering to the value of cooperation – Europe’s birth certificate – should be proud of this, do it well, and make it visible! 
– Kyriakos, IVY Reporter for the Managing Authority Interreg Romania-Bulgaria
