Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.2002, Side 48

46
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF TRANSNATIONAL COOPERATION
IN NORDIC ATLANTIC REGIONS
f'ul aim of the BEAR initiative, one must
ask why there has not been stronger en-
couragement of science and technology co-
operation with in the West Nordic Cooper-
ation. Evidently, there is not a particularly
high level of scientific and technological
activity in the West Nordic Countries, at
least looked at per capita (Jónsson, 1994a).
The (national) systems of innovation are
weak, and the many examples of innova-
tions in the Icelandic fisheries-related in-
dustries are typically more directly related
to small-scale and direct producer/user-ori-
ented development. This kind of more local
and sector-specific innovation is perhaps
not registered in the offícial statistics, but
even so, a higher degree of dependence on
foreign (i.e. Danish and Norwegian) insti-
tutes of research and education in fisheries,
could pose a problem in the long run.
West Nordic participation in the BEAR
initiative’s marine science and technology
cooperation could mean new perspectives
for both West Nordic, Norwegian and
Russian fisheries, as the networks already
exist and the amount of competition from
Icelandic partners would be neither too lit-
tle nor too much. For the Faroe Islands and
Greenland especially, such an agenda
would represent new possibilities - includ-
ing opportunities for new Faroese and
Greenlandic entrepreneurs to act on a
broader agenda, outside the traditional so-
cial control of small societies. NORA couid
also contribute to the building of new net-
works and institutions between Greenland,
Iceland, Faroe Islands and Norway.
The formalised and general Nordic Co-
operation on fisheries has developed since
the first Nordic Fisheries Conference in
1949, followed by several cooperative ef-
forts within the framework of first the
Nordic Council, and later the Nordic Coun-
cil of Ministers (Bergman, 1994). So far, it
has been a cooperation of governments,
representatives from the fishing industry
and research bodies. These activities have
without doubt developed the existing net-
works within the Nordic fisheries sector,
and not least among these, research insti-
tutes related to fisheries. This is certainly
the case with the projects supported by the
Nordic Council of Ministers (Fisheries
Ministers) and the Nordic Committee of
Officials for Fisheries; these projects and
conferences have been documented in sev-
eral NORD and TemaNORD publications
in recent years.
The 1993-96 programme for Nordic
Fisheries Cooperation, decided upon by the
Fisheries Ministries in 1992, clearly states
an ambition to participate in the building of
stronger Nordic institutions and networks
in order to enable the Nordic fishing sectors
able to meet the challenges presented by
EU integration (Nordic Council of Minis-
ters, 1992: 65, 72). These cooperation ef-
forts are undoubtedly most successful in
coordinating the national public research
sectors, and less successful in coordinating
a more regionalised effort, i.e. in the Baltic
Sea or the North Atlantic, or in informal
and as yet un-institutionalised innovative
milieux. Nordic fisheries cooperation has
more internal cooperation as a main objec-
tive, and this has had a substantial positive
effect on the development of know-how in
the North Atlantic fisheries. On the olher