During the meeting, Mr Urkullu presented to the President of Asturias the objectives of the Foundation he chairs, as part of a series of consultations with institutions and key stakeholders from across the Atlantic coastline. Both leaders shared eAtlantic’s commitment to promoting the prosperity of the communities that make up this geographical area and to fostering participatory governance by engaging both public and private actors in this process.

The President of eAtlantic also placed particular emphasis on the working group established by the Foundation to identify, within the Atlantic coastline, the most relevant recommendations and proposals emerging from the reports of Enrico Letta and Mario Draghi. Its purpose is to identify flagship projects of Atlantic scale, formulate proposals that contribute to aligning plans and investments with the EU’s strategic agenda, and support the development of the Atlantic macro-region project.

In this regard, Lehendakari Urkullu invited the Government of Asturias to join this initiative and called for its collaboration in mobilising Asturian socio-economic actors. Within this framework, eAtlantic also seeks to contribute to the establishment of the Atlantic Macro-Region, an initiative previously championed by Urkullu as Lehendakari and actively supported by the Government of Asturias in recent years, in recognition of the fact that the challenges of the future cannot be faced in isolation. Asturias shares common interests with other Atlantic regions in key areas such as tourism, logistics, green hydrogen, marine energy and maritime connectivity. For this reason, it advocates the creation of suitable governance structures that enable the various territories to play an active role in decisions crucial to their shared future.