Recent activities ...
State borders represent market imperfections that potentially reduce welfare in border regions. Reasons are different administrative and legal systems, exchange rate fluctuations, customs duties, multiple infrastructures, infrastructural discontinuities or language. The EU Community Initiative INTERREG was launched in 1990 to reduce social and economic frictions and their consequences at EU internal and external borders and to strengthen the goal of economic integration. In October 2019, the consortium consisting of Eureconsult (Echternach, Luxemburg), Dr. Dräger & Thielmann (Frankfurt) and PRAC (Bad Soden) was assigned with a research contract to execute the Ex-ante Evaluation of the new INTERREG VI-A programme "Alpine Rhine - Lake Constance - High Upper Rhine". The main task of PRAC was the assessment and systematic conceptualisation of the programme indicator system. In 2021 and 2022, two further separate research contracts for (i) the elaboration of the Performance Framework and (ii) a cascade-like indicator system with a special focus on funding inputs and statistical estimation of achievable outputs were awarded to PRAC. The client is the Regierungspräsidium Tübingen.Within the framework of the accompanying evaluation of the EAFRD program "EULLE" in Rhineland-Palatinate, PRAC prepared a study for the interim evaluation of flood protection in the Upper Rhine region. The focus was on the change of damage expectation due to increasing land prices and growth of settlement and traffic areas in the floodplains. Access to the study: on the EULLE website
At the summer conference of the German Society for Regional Science (GfR), convened at the IAB in Nuremberg end of June 2023, R. Bergs (PRAC) presented an empirical comparative study on sealed surfaces in city districts and cities affiliated to rural districts based on scaling laws. A preprint is available on ArXiv: Change of impervious space in German cities: A scaling law analysis. ArXiv 15 May 2023. http://arxiv.org/abs/2305.07989.
Together with Rüdiger Budde from the RWI-Leibniz-Institute of Economic Research Rolf Bergs was guest editor of volume 42 (issue 2) of the Review of Regional Research dealing with "The potential of small-scale spatial data".
Publication: Bergs, R. and Budde, R. (2022) The potential of small-scale spatial data in regional science. Review of Regional Research, Vol. 42(2)
Current projects in Germany:
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Ongoing evaluation of the EAFRD funded rural development programme "EULLE" Rheinland-Palatinate 2014-2020:
Measures: (1) Rural and agricultural infrastructure, (2) Infrastructure in steepslope viticulture and (3) flood protection; further to that causal inference analysis of impacts of farm subsidies and support to reporting on the Partnership Agreement (in cooperation with the Institut für ländliche Strukturforschung a.d. Universität Frankfurt), on behalf of the Ministry of Economy, Transport, Agriculture and Viticulture of Rhineland-Palatinate
Contact person: Rolf Bergs
Time frame: 2015-2026 -
Ongoing evaluation of the economic and structural programme of the Rhenish
mining area (WSP):
Contributions to the evaluation of programme indicators and spatial data analyses, in particular pollutant and greenhouse gas emissions
Project under the direction of VDI Technologiezentrum GmbH, in cooperation with the RWI-Leibniz Institute for Economic Research and on behalf of the Ministry of Economic Affairs, Industry, Climate Protection and Energy of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia
Contact person: Rolf Bergs
Time frame: December 2023 - 2028
Current and recent international projects:
- Thematic Expert for the EENRD Evaluation Helpdesk
(DG AGRI) on quantitative evaluation methodologies
Time frame: since 2014
Time frame: 2017-2021
Assigned researchers: Rolf Bergs, Moneim Issa, Karlheinz Knickel (06/2017-12/2020), supported by Marina Kobzeva (06/2018-01/2019)
Responsibility: Rolf Bergs, Moneim Issa
Time frame: 2019-2021