The fourth Interregional Steering Committee Meeting of the CultMark Operation took place last November in Chester, with the participation of representatives from all partner places and the President of DEMKA Nea Ionia Magnesia (Lead Partner) Mr George Tamias.

At the beginning of the meeting the Chester Culture Portfolio holder, Councillor of Chester City Council Mrs Ann Farell welcomed the representatives of the partners in Chester and emphasized on the importance of the Operation for the Chester Canal Partnership.

The Management and Coordination Unit of CultMark presented an overview of the Work Programme and the actions that were completed in each partner area. Afterwards, each partner presented their progress, including the demonstration actions. For DEMKA Mr Alpus showed the video of Nea Ionia and distributed the Map of Nea Ionia that was produced in the framework of CultMark. Mr. Mike O’ Kell of the Chester Canal Partnership presented the Canal Festival (held in September 2005 with the participation of CultMark partners) and the Video of the Canal. The representative of Kainuu, Mr Tuomo Tahvanainen, presented the local actions in Kainuu, such as the Kajaani Castle, the Kalevala gastronomy event, the Oulujoki River Photo Exhibition and showed the local video. Dr Andreas Schubert and Dr Wolf Karge presented the actions in Rostock (public art, museum concept) and the State Technical Museum (Exhibition Wind Energy), respectively. Finally, Mr Nasos Hatzigeorgiou presented the actions in Pafos, the development of the website, the infokiosk, the Tourism Strategic Plan, the Aphrodite Festival (held in September 2005 with the participation of CultMark partners) and the signing of St. Paul’s Trails.

Next there was a presentation of the Thematic Working Groups Meetings that took place in Pafos on 4-5 September 2005 (‘Marketing Strategies’, in conjunction with the Aphrodite Festival) and Chester on 18-19 September 2005 (‘Cultural Heritage Assets’, in conjunction with the Canal Festival) and the next Working Groups Meeting were discussed.

The Project Coordinator presented the results of the Mid-term Self–Assessment, which were encouraging and identified the areas for improvements.

As far as the Publicity and Dissemination Actions were concerned, the participation of the Operation through the Pafos stand in World Travel Market (14-17 November 2005, in London) was discussed. The Coordinator also presented the conclusions of the INTERREG IIIC Communication Seminar in Vienna.

Finally, the Project Coordinator informed the partners about the participation of the Lead Partner DEMKA and the Management and Coordination Unit in the INTERREG IIIC Forum in Brussels 28-29 November 2005.

In the evening of the same day, the Sheriff of Chester held a civic reception at the Council Chamber in honour of the visiting delegations. The Sheriff in his address stressed the value of the CultMark Operation for the Chester Canal Partnership and stated that he is looking forward to the final results of the Operation. The President of DEMKA (Lead partner) invited the Sheriff and senior representatives of the UK partnership to Nea Ionia, Greece for the Final Conference in September 2006. At the civic reception also present were the Former Sheriff of Chester (who had paid an official visit to Nea Ionia in 2004 for the Olympics , within CultMark “Olympic City” image and legacy demonstration actions), Elected Councillors of Chester City Council, the Mayor of Ellesmere Port and Neston, the Distinctiveness and Place Marketing Manager and the Tourism Manager of Chester City Council.