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The Strategy of Cluj-Napoca

Key Words: 

  • quality of life;
  • Structural involvement of expert groups from the community;

Strategic dimensions within the plan:

  • people and community;
  • innovative, creative, competitive city (ICC);
  • urban development and spatial planning;
  • green city;
  • good governance;
  • culture and local identity;
  • healthy city;
  • safe city;

Work groups that activated in the process of planning and coordination:

People and Community:

  • WG Associative and Philanthropy;
  • WG Multiculturalism;
  • WG University Education ;
  • WG High School Education;
  • WG Social Inclusion;
  • WG Demography and Human Resources;
  • WG Community Mediation;
  • WG Youth;

Innovative, Creative, Competitive City (ICC):

  • WG Local Economic Development;
  • WG Tourism;
  • WG IT;
  • WG Different City, Territorial Marketing;
  • WG Innovative Entrepreneurship in the Community;

Urban Development and Spatial Planning:

  • WG urban development and spatial planning;

Green City:

  • WG Environment;

Safe City:

  • WG Safe City;

Good Governance:

  • WG E-government;
  • WG Participate;

Culture and Local Identity:

  • WG European Dimension of Cluj;
  • WG Regional Leadership;
  • WG Cinematography;
  • WG Historical Identity of the City;
  • WG Culture and Creative Industry;

Healthy Cluj:

  • WG Public Health;
  • WG Human-animal relationship management in the urban context;

The Vision (sustainable future projection: 2027):

Cluj-Napoca defines its development in terms of quality of life. Cluj-Napoca will be a space for individual and collective achievement, with active citizens, a creative, complex dynamic and competitive economic environment, able to use the resources in an integrated manner and provide sustainable development of the community.

Cluj will be a model of good governance with a transparent, progressive and proficient administration, where the citizen is considered a partner of the administration;

Cluj will be a center of academic excellence where the academic environment, engaged in the life of the community, will be a source of creativity, innovation and research;

Cluj will be a European benchmark through its dynamic and vibrant cultural life, that supports experimentation and initiative. Culture will be an important factor in organizing the community, becoming the engine of social transformation and urban regeneration.

Cluj-Napoca will be a city that promotes the principles of social inclusion and territorial cohesion, ensuring the participation of the vulnerable groups in the decision making process concerning development priorities.

Cluj will be defined as a European city, the historic capital of Transylvania, a unique and intercultural community.

Cul-Napoca will be a network of interconnected communities, laboratory of social creativity, a city with young spirit, equally friendly and responsible.

Strategical Factors:

  • innovation;
  • universities;
  • participation;

Sources of Competitive Advantages for Cluj:

1. First of all, Cluj-Napoca is a university town. All the competitive advantages of Cluj binds directly od indirectly of the academic profile:

  • university tradition;
  • intellectual capital;
  • the diversity in education;
  • the quality and value of universities degrees;
  • the increased potential of internationalization;
  • the integration potential of university research and innovation in community development;

2. The city has a significant demographic dynamism:

  • Cluj population is not decreasing, reflecting a demographic trend quite rare in the communities of Romania;
  • the city attracts and retain a very specialized workforce, based on the number and quality of graduates;
  • Cluj is one of the few cities in Romania and in the region where the phenomenon of suburbanization/expansion to the periphery is not doubled by population decline and by the contraction of the economy;

3. Participation and involvement in the community have a generator of competitive advantage:

  • the high degree of associativity is visible through sophistication of the NGO, which is a hub of expertise, a pole of good practice and financial attraction.
  • The community can invest with a high degree of success in areas such as participatory governance;
  • the city’s increased funds. Organizations bring together individuals with varied experience. Cluj can become a long-term space of social innovation.

4. Impressive urban tradition and a complex historical heritage:

  • Built heritage, especially in the central/historical area of the city but also in the accessible metropolitan areas;

5. An increased potential of development in the cultural and creative industries area:

  • Cluj-Napoca has a pecific cultural vitality, an important cultural diversity, a consistent cultural consumption and a positive percentage in participation in cultural events (TIFF, Paintbrush Factory, etc.)

6. The community has developed a promising multicultural space. The atmosphere is favorable to multicultural policies and to a good practice model regarding the implementation of multicultural policies.

7. Cluj-Napoca is a center of excellence in medicine:

The contribution of this area, to the strategic objective of increasing the quality of life is essential, due to its provision of quality of care for all social categories (national and international). Because of the specialized university programs, the city presents a pole in medical research and public health, has a major potential in collaboration between universities and the private sector, and it develops a high degree of academic internationalization.

8. Cluj-Napoca is a pole of economic competitiveness, international connected:

  • Having a budget with a diversified structure and with a high potential of clusters in multiple domains;
  • Cluj-Napoca’s economy is very successful in the IT and financial services, the latest illustration of this performance is found as a strategic project-Cluj Innovation City;
  • There is an excellent potential for developing an ICC economy (innovative, creative and competitive). The ICC economy fits consistently in the European strategic objective of smart growth;

9. The city is a national pole of growth:

Cluj-Napoca wins development opportunities (certain investments/financing directed towards the seven national urban poles of growth), but at the same time, has the role of multiplying this potential in communities and urban centers that are smaller in the polarization area, thereby creating an economically developed and competitive region.

Full article: Cluj-Napoca 2014-2020 Development Strategy