The EBTH combines the strength and knowledge of several powerful enterprising personalities in The Hague to boost the city’s economic competitiveness. It provides solicited and unsolicited economic advice to the municipality, initiates projects that promote employment and the investment climate and reinforces the profile of The Hague as an entrepreneurial city. The EBTH does this with the following goal in mind:

To achieve a strong, innovative economy in The Hague, one in which small and medium-sized enterprises are resilient in the transition to the Next Economy

The EBTH has translated this into the following three objectives which it is working to achieve and continually assesses whether its activities are making a sufficient contribution.

Three roles

Previously, the efforts of the Economic Board The Hague were divided into three clear core roles: solicited and unsolicited advice, ambassador of the city and initiating projects. However, due to the change of course and further development of the EBTH, the focus will be more on the first two roles: the advisory and ambassador role.

1. Economic policy adviser for the City of The Hague.
One of the EBTH’s core tasks is to act as a sounding board and mirror for the City of The Hague’s economic policy. It therefore responds to the municipality’s need for structural input and feedback from businesses and other economic players in the city, which helps to shape policy. This input and feedback is important if the municipality is to address the right themes, opportunities and pressure points in its policy, to keep public investment attuned to changes in the market and to gauge and/or build support for economic plans. The EBTH also serves as a ‘reality check’ for the municipality by examining the relationship between officialdom’s views on the city’s economy and the business community’s views and how this fits in with hard economic data about The Hague.

2. Ambassador for The Hague as an innovative and entrepreneurial city
The EBTH is a committed ambassador for The Hague as an innovative and entrepreneurial city. This role largely coincides with the EBTH’s communication tasks.

3. Initiator and driver of economic projects
Previously, the Economic Board The Hague focused on initiating projects and funding was also available for this. Nowadays, attention is more focused on the advisory and ambassador role. As a board, we are still looking at promising projects to accelerate or combine in consultation with the municipality of The Hague. We always look at the added value and the impact that a project can have on the prosperity of The Hague as a whole.

The full commitment and course of the Economic Board The Hague is laid down in the Vision document for 2022 and beyond.