Stockholm is a joggers’ paradise. Yesterday morning and this morning I ran all the way around one of the islands, Kungsholmen, in beautiful early morning sunlight. Gmaps tells me this is a round trip of 12 kilometres. This morning I got a little adventurous and clambered over rocks so as to keep as close to the coast as possible. The run takes in several waterfront parks, a suburb of small and beautifully painted holiday homes, some new apartment blocks, still being built, a dock with a number of old tugboats and Stockholm’s iconic town hall, where the Nobel prizes (apart from the peace prize) are awarded. There is also much wildlife – particularly birdlife – to be seen. A perfect start to both days, and one that I shared with a great number of early-morning walkers, joggers and cyclists.

This evening the Swedish Ministry of Rural Affairs hosted a gala dinner in honour of the EESC’s President and members. My neighbour (to my right in the picture) was Charlotta Eriksson, who is the spokesperson for Eskil Erlandson (Centre Party), the Minister for Rural Affairs. Charlotta’s father is a farmer and so she grew up with a natural understanding of the importance of farming, both as an economic activity and as a social and cultural necessity. State Secretary Magnus Kindbom, fresh back from the Rio+20 talks, gave a welcoming speech. Through all of these speeches and exchanges of views and meetings we have rapidly developed a feeling for the Swedish model – not just economic, but societal. Sweden is, clearly, a good place to be and, just as clearly, the Swedes are determined to keep it that way!

There was just enough time after the end of the enlarged Presidency meeting and before the beginning of our formal dinner for a quick stroll and to taste some beer. We found a friendly place on the Riksgatan, quite close to the Royal Palace where, as the picture shows, the Vice-President, Anna Maria Darmanin, and I sampled the local lager (and very good it was too). We have been lucky so far with the weather. The locals tell us that June was a rotten month, full of rain. Today has been sunny, but it is still cold enough in the evening for the bars and cafés to leave blankets on the chairs for those customers who chose to sit outside.

This afternoon the EESC’s ‘enlarged enlarged’ Presidency (the President, Vice-Presidents, Group Presidents , Section Presidents and the Secretary General) met to discuss and agree on a series of internal matters, from Section priorities to input into the Commission’s 2013 work programme, to a set of own-initiative opinions, to budgetary issues and the EESC’s input into the European Year of Citizens. It was a very full afternoon’s work and, satisfyingly, a very productive meeting.

Lunch today was kindlily hosted by the Federation of Swedish Farmers (LRF) at the organisation’s Stockholm headquarters (Franzéngatan). In his welcoming words LRF Vice-President Thomas Magnusson reminded us that this was very much an organisation in which the EESC’s President, Staffan Nilsson, had been closely involved and for a long time, at first as a local and regional leader, and later as a member of the board of directors.

This morning the EESC’s enlarged Presidency held a thematic seminar on organised civil society, kindly hosted in the Sewdish Prime Minister’s headquarters building, the Rosenbad. We heard first from the feisty Swedish minister for European Union Affairs, Birgitta Ohlsson (on the left in the picture), before our President, Staffan Nilsson, chaired two discussions. The first, on ‘the Swedish model – the role of social dialogue’, was addressed by Christin Johansson, a board member of the Swedish Confederation of Professional Associations (SACO), Per Bardh, Vice President of the Swedish Trade Union Confederation (LO) and Christer Agren, Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise (Svenskt Näringsliv). We learnt a huge amount, particularly about the history that has led to the specificities of the so-called Swedish model. The model relies on such organisations being able to deliver reliably so that collective agreements stick and is clearly also based on a collegial sense of what the economy requires, leading to situations that might seem strange in other countries (such as industry encouraging a high level of trade union membership and an absence of industrial disruption when companies necessarily restructure). The second session was on the role of civil dialogue on the environment and consumer affairs and was addressed by Helena Jonsson, the President of the Federation of Swedish Farmers (LRF) and Örjan Brinkman of the Swedish Consumers’ Association (Sveriges Konsumenter) and was again very informative.

We were back in Stockholm this evening in time for a certain football match. I watched part of it on a giant screen in a square near to our hotel, the rest back in my room. What is there to say? We were, quite simply, treated to a master class. I shudder to think how the England team would have fared against such a team. The Italians were understandably gutted, particularly Andrea Pirlo, who had had such a good tournament until the final. As spectacle, the final provided great entertainment and was a good advertisement for the game. I am glad for Torres that he scored but, like many I suspect, the images of the final that will live on in my memory are Pirlo’s sad tears on the one hand and Torres’s children in his arms on the other. And now we have a few free evenings before Wimbledon starts to worm its way into our consciousness…

I took the morning flight to Stockholm this Sunday morning and met up there with an advanced party of members and staff assembling for a meeting of the EESC’s ‘enlarged enlarged Presidency’ (the President, Vice-Presidents, Group Presidents, Section Presidents and the Secretary General). Our first and most informative and agreeable task was a trip out to a model farm, Övergrans Jordbruk, where we were warmly received by the entreprenurially-spirited owner, Leif Zetterberg (that’s him in the checked shirt in the picture). He explained to us how he has gradually converted various farm buildings, bought from the local church, into a series of inter-related viable economic activities, several run by local cooperatives. Thus, his daughters breed Icelandic horses; the tractor shed has been converted into a micro-brewery (and makes excellent beer, I can confirm!); he grows speciality vegetables and fruit, such as blueberries and white cucumbers; and he runs a restaurant and a functions room and a hotel. In the picture we were gazing out onto Leif’s pasture and an adjoining lake. His daughters were putting two of the Icelandic horses through their paces. It was an idyllic scene and encouraged peaceful reflection. Later, Leif treated us to a traditional Swedish summer meal of salmon and new potatoes. It was a lovely start to the week.

This afternoon I had a catch-up session with the EESC President, Staffan Nilsson. He has been extraordinarily busy over the past two weeks, representing the Committee in Paris, at the French Economic, Social and Environmental Council’s formal meeting with the new President, François Hollande; in Rio, at the EU-Brazil Round Table, the General Assembly of the International Association of Economic and Social Councils and Similar Institutions and at the Rio + 20 talks themselves; then in Moscow, at the Fifth Joint Workshop between the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation and the EESC; and finally in Berlin, at the 30th EU-Turkey Joint Consultative Committee meeting. Staffan is indefatigible. This evening he flies home to Sweden, to his farm, and on Sunday he will travel down to Stockholm to join the members of the enlarged Presidency, who on Monday and Tuesday will be holding an extraordinary meeting with Swedish  government representatives and civil society organisations. Just listing all of this has made me a little breathless. Still we caught up on everything before he dashed back to his dairy herd for, yes, when Staffan is not representing the EESC, he is an active farmer…

This morning I had the most agreeable duty of formally declaring open the Human Resources Information Point of the EESC’s HR Directorate. Open to all EESC staff, the information point provides a welcoming team (in the picture: Luis Durán (supervisor) Teresa Iurilli and Attila Kutasi) that will answer all administrative questions and will guide colleagues through procedures and paperwork… There was a truly festive air for the occasion and I got to do something I have never done before: cut a ribbon. Our HR colleagues are unceasing in their efforts to support the Committee’s administration better and the information point is a good example of that. It is not just a matter of EESC or EU procedures. Like all expatriates, we also have to nevigate our way through local procedures and processes. The help desk, a thoroughly commendable initiative, is there to help with all of that. Well done, everybody!