ESPAD–EMCDDA cooperation
Collaboration between the ESPAD and the EMCDDA started in 1995, when the agency became operational. The collaboration was formalized by a ‘cooperation framework’ agreed in 2007. The agreement recognised mutual benefits of joint activities and called for a closer collaboration in exchange of information and expertise to improve the availability, quality and comparability of school survey data, as well as to gain analytical insight from the data available in this area.The results of joint activities undertaken in the past years have proved the usefulness of the co-operation for both organizations. ESPAD data have become an increasingly important component in the EMCDDA’s reporting on the European drug situation. Another example of the use of ESPAD data is the joint ESPAD-EMCDDA analysis of poly drug use. Besides of hosting the 2011 ESPAD Project meeting EMCDDA has supported the dissemination of ESPAD data by the production and editing of the 2007 ESPAD summary report and its translation into 23 languages. EMCDDA has also supported ESPAD data collections in several Balkan countries.
Based on the mutually positive experiences, a joint statement to scale up cooperation between ESPAD and the EMCDDA was adopted at the Annual ESPAD Project Meeting on 28 November 2011.
In the joint statement they agreed to:
- develop an enhanced dissemination strategy of ESPAD findings (including a multilingual approach);
- work together to ensure harmonisation of methods and to support methodological development;
- develop a joint work programme to contribute to long-term sustainability of the ESPAD network (e.g. joint analyses, data sharing); and
- meet regularly to review joint activities.
