Activities
National Strategic Reference Framework 2007-2013
The ESC takes part, as it did during the third Community Support Framework, in the national committee as well as the individual committees of the eight Sectoral Programmes, the five Regional Programmes and the 12 Territorial Cooperation programmes of the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) for the 2007-2013 period.
Initiatives for the Environment
Faced with the rapid deterioration of the environment associated with climate change which has become a day-to-day concern rather than a problem of the distant future, the ESC, desiring to express society's concerns, began in June 2007 an initiative to record and analyse environmental developments in the trilogy “Climate Change,” “Spatial Planning and Urban Design,” “Protection of the Environment.” Widescale provision of information and the development of a debate aimed at raising the awareness of everyone concerned, from the ordinary citizen to the competent agencies, constitute the driving force behind this initiative. The ESC has already issued three own-initiative opinions on the environment, which were presented at events in Thessaloniki and Patras. The main event was held at the Athens Concert Hall.
Prefectural Economic and Social Committees (PESCs)
Institutions of social dialogue are one component of the European Social Model, particularly as it developed in the post-war period.
In Greece, Prefectural Economic and Social Committees (PESCs) were set up under Law 2218/1994 (“Establishment of prefectural government, amendment of provisions on first-tier local government and the regions and other provisions”), as opiniondelivering instruments in the framework of prefectural government, which is the second level of local government.
At present, a number of PESCs have been created in most prefectures of the country. Their progress, along with problems regarding their operation, were recorded in meetings held beginning in 1997 on the ESC's initiative, which were attended by the leading representatives of the PESCs.
PESC meetings were held in Athens on 17 May 1997, in Volos on 27 June 1998, in Samos on 9 September 1999, in Kalamata on 25 November 2000, in Ioannina on 26 January 2002, in Alexandroupoli on 5 July 2003, in Patras on 23 October 2004, in Arta on 10 December 2005, in Chania on 18 November 2006, in Bolos on 7 February 2009 and in Agrinio 20 February 2010.