Mayor Sharon Dijksma with Utrecht businesses and royal couple in California for trade mission

At the beginning of September, Mayor Sharon Dijksma will travel to the United States, together with more than twenty companies, knowledge institutions and organizations from the Utrecht region, to take part in a national trade mission to California. In her capacity as President of the Economic Board Utrecht (EBU), she will be present from 5 to 7 September at the trade mission on the themes Life Sciences & Health and Urban Mobility.

“As EBU president, I will be traveling to San Francisco with a number of board members and these companies to discuss economic cooperation with US partners,” Dijksma wrote in a memo. .

Not only Mayor Dijksma and various organizations from Utrecht travel to California, but also King Willem-Alexander, Queen Máxima and a number of ministers. These include Minister Kuipers for Health, Welfare and Sport and Minister Dijkgraaf for Education, Culture and Science.

The trade mission focuses on life sciences and health and urban mobility. According to Dijksma, these are important themes for Utrecht. “These are two subjects on which the region of Utrecht is expressly profiled and in which our region has a leading activity. This is confirmed by the large delegation from our region to this mission.

Important region

September will include interviews with the Mayor of San Francisco and the Lieutenant Governor of California. Dijksma also says he wants to discuss possible cooperation with them ahead of COP27: a climate conference in November in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm-el-Sheikh. She does this from her role as Special Envoy to the United Nations Cities Network.

Dijksma also participates in a number of round tables, notably on the challenges that major cities are facing or will face in the future. She also speaks with members of the EBU Board of Directors with the Phoenix Economic Council, which she says is an important region in the field of both life sciences and health as sustainable mobility.