Dublin City University, Queens University Belfast and the Workers Educational Association in Northern Ireland have come together to establish a centre to research and develop ideas for practical cross-Border co-operation. The Centre for Cross Border Studies will begin work at the Queens University campus in Armagh this month. Its first director is Andy Pollak of The Irish Times, who will be taking 18 months' leave of absence from the newspaper - where he has been education correspondent in recent years - to set up the centre.

Its pilot phase will be funded by the EU Special Programme for Peace and Reconciliation.

The centre's founders believe that controversy about relations between Northern Ireland and the Republic tends to obscure the wide consensus that exists about the value of cross-Border co-operation on practical issues. This consensus holds that the abnormally low level - by EU standards - of contact and communication across the Border damages the well-being of both parts of the island.

"This pragmatic view, which holds that co-operation should take place where real practical benefits can be seen to accrue, is weakened by an additional factor: there has been too little research to date on how this practical co-operation can be achieved," Pollak says.

"The Centre for Cross Border Studies will provide an objective, university-based environment for policy research into and development of such practical co-operation."

Among the research projects the new centre will be examining are the first "baseline study" of the current state of cross-Border co-operation; a study of successful cross-border initiatives elsewhere in the EU, notably the Euregio model on the Dutch-German border; a series of informal training seminars for civil and public servants, North and South; cross-Border training and exchanges between teachers involved in civic, social and political education; and work with the IBEC-CBI Joint Business Council to research continuing obstacles to business co-operation.

The centre's board will be chaired by Chris Gibson, chairman of the Confederation of British Industry (Northern Ireland) and co-chairman of the Joint Business Council. Other members are Professor Mari Fitzduff, head of the University of Ulster's conflict resolution institute (INCORE); Dr Pauric Travers, president of St Patrick's College, Drumcondra; Dr Liam O'Dowd, professor of sociology at Queen's University; Paul Nolan, director of the Workers Educational Association in Northern Ireland; and Brian Trench of Dublin City University's school of communications.