The objective of the Arctic Award is to identify good practice, promote Arctic cross-border collaboration, and raise awareness among projects of each other. The awards aim to highlight innovative projects with a clear Arctic dimension, which are viewed as inspirational in their participating regions as well as being seen as creating real, measurable impacts on the ground, and being of direct benefit to Arctic communities.

This year, the Arctic Awards focus on the following two award categories:

Arctic entrepreneurial spirit

• Projects supporting core entrepreneurial skills required for people with multiple incomes (employment/self-employment/micro companies), support to business clusters fostering critical mass in demand, assisting in the strengthening of entrepreneurial diversity.
• Projects  supporting businesses based on Arctic opportunities and cultural heritage (food innovation, tourism, creative and cultural industries, indigenous cultural businesses; as well as the assisting of niche industries’ move to commercialisation.
• Projects focused on boosting young entrepreneurs’ abilities to create successful business opportunities in remote and rural areas, such as establishing networks, providing new skills, offering an enabling environment in high north regions

Overcoming critical mass

• Distance spanning technology (eHealth, education, governmental services, culture)
• Match making and clustering for SMEs in Arctic sectors (cross-sector collaboration, export, business incubation) pooling resources to meet (external) market demands (supply chain innovation, branding, combined portfolio of competences).
• Improving connectivity and accessibility across borders, with a focus on young people opportunities for mobility, creating more resilient communities
• Increasing opportunities to exchange knowledge and skills within a community of experts through mechanisms for overcoming isolation, such as peer-to-peer, hubs as well as mentoring services.

The competition is open to projects funded by the NPA or NPP, Interreg Botnia-Atlantica, Interreg Nord and Kolarctic and Karelia CBC programmes.  
The application form and further details will be announced soon on this website. The closing date for submission will be 30th April 2020.

For keeping up to date with the joint initiatives of the Arctic Cooperation programmes, follow @ArcticCooperation on Facebook.