Meeting of the Information Society Commission (Union of the Baltic Cities) and the meeting of Senior Officials on Information Society
(Council of the Baltic Sea States) Saint-Petersburg, October, 27, 2005

The meeting of the Information Society Commission of the Union of the Baltic Cities international organization (UBC IS Com) was held in October 27 in St.-Petersburg in Smolny (the City Government) its subject being "Participation of the cities in creation of integrated information space of the Baltic sea Region".

The meeting was aimed at the detailed discussion of the Commission role in developing of mutual interaction in the field of information society and information technologies between the UBC member-cities, and also specification of joint priority directions of the further cooperation to ensure grounds for creation of long-term projects considering the preparation to the II World Summit of Cities and Local Authorities on the Information Society (Bilbao, 9-11 November, 2005).

The new Chair of the IS Com was confirmed, being the Chairman of the Committee on IT Innovations and Communications of the Government of St.-Petersburg Evgeny Tsivirko.

Evgeny Tsivirko -Chair of the IS Com, Chairman of the IT Innovations and Communication, St.-Petersburg Government

Within the course of the IS Com meeting the participants made their reports devoted to the state of art and main trends of development of the information society and IT in their cities. The participants have discussed perspective directions of cooperation within the IS Com framework.

In his report E.Tsivirko has marked the potential and prospects of St.-Petersburg in the international cooperation development in the Baltic Sea Region and stressed the role of the Union of the Baltic Cities as the organization, that appears to be the most important ground to take decisions and as of its body - IS Com. E.Tsivirko has pointed out the state of art of IT innovations in our city: "Information society processes in St.-Petersburg are objective processes ensuring formation and development of integrated economic space, that is mutually connected to trade markets functioning, markets of information and knowledge, capital and labour". Evgeny Tsivirko has suggested the participants of the meeting to take an active part in the Commission activities.
The joint Action Plan of the UBC IS Com for the year 2006 was adopted as the meeting's outcome.

In parallel, 27, October, in Smolny there was carried out a meeting of the Senior Officials on Information Society of the Council of the Baltic Sea States international governmental organization.
Representatives of the Committee on IT Innovations and Communications and the Committee on External Relations and Tourism of St.-Petersburg took part in the meeting. The head of the unit of information and analytical supporting and IT innovations developing, Committee on IT Innovations and Communications, Alexander Demidov has made a report on activities of the state executive bodies of St.-Petersburg in the field of IT innovations development in the city. Senior Officials have shown their great interest to the city of St.-Petersburg and the specific suggestions on the cooperation were put forward, in particular, within the framework of the Northern eDimension programme.
In the evening, 27th, October, the joint reception for both meetings' participants was held in Ambassador hotel on behalf of the Government of Saint-Petersburg.

Contacts: Ms. Jelena Ivanova, +7 812 756 4189, e.ivanova@vg.gov.spb.ru
Mr. Vlad Balsky, +7 812 576 7504, balsky@kvs.gov.spb.ru