• 1 February 2010
• Roundup of presentations and discussion from last week's dissemination event on the Regional Skills Assessment and regional skills policy. Read more »

• 1 February 2010
• We've launched a survey asking what you think of our website and how it can be improved. The survey should only take 3 minutes to complete and we would very much value your feedback. Go to the survey »

• 29 January 2010
• Roundup of presentations and discussion from yesterday's event on what the Regional Skills Assessment means for local and sub-regional organisations. Read more »

• 28 January 2010
• Roundup of presentations, discussion and key themes from our event last week on environmental technologies skills. Read more »

• 27 January 2010
• West Midlands organisations using Ordnance Survey data – how are you getting involved in CLG's consultation to make OS mapping data freely available? Read more »

• 26 January 2010
• Our interactive map of Jobseeker's Allowance claimant data is featured in the Guardian's top 10 government visualisations. Read more »

• 25 January 2010
• Summary and presentations from last week's workshop for West Midlands local authority researchers, hosted by the Observatory and Local Authorities Research & Intelligence Association. Read more »

• 22 January 2010
• Black Country Consortium seek a Head of Intelligence and two researchers. Read more »

• 21 January 2010
• Learner participation in new 14–19 Diplomas in the West Midlands focused on Creative & Media. Read more »

• 20 January 2010
• Maps, data and analysis of new unemployment statistics for the West Midlands released today by ONS. Read more »

• 20 January 2010
• Analysis of migrant workers in the West Midlands. Read more »

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• State of the Region Report 2009
  
  This report brings together some of the key evidence from the State of the Region dialogues, a new process we started in 2008, with a range of other information about the major issues facing the West Midlands.

• State of the Region Dialogues
  
  We've published new reports from our work on State of the Region Thematic Dialogues:
  
  Refreshing the regional evidence base (PDF, 1.3mb)
  
  Challenge or opportunity? How to plan for climate change (PDF, 1.3mb)
  
  What makes a sustainable community? (PDF, 337kb)
  
  The West Midlands' changing population (PDF, 489kb)
  
  The importance of innovation in a changing economy (PDF, 685kb)
  
  West Midlands' knowledge economy (PDF, 383kb)

• Green infrastructure (PDF, 929kb)
  
  Bill Heslegrave, West Midlands Regional Director of the Forestry Commission, has written a chapter on green infrastructure (PDF, 929kb) for the West Midlands: Fit for the Future? project.

• West Midlands: fit for the future?
  
  A book of ten chapters by ten different authors, each giving their personal view on how the West Midlands can best place itself in readiness for the economic recovery. The issues raised in this book were debated at the Observatory's 2009 Annual Conference.

• Monitoring the economic recession
  
  We analyse the latest conditions and trends to inform partners on how the economic recession is impacting the West Midlands economy, population, skills and labour market, cultural sector and the places most vulnerable to the recession.
  
  We also analyse the latest employment and unemployment data published monthly by the ONS.

• Economic inclusion research
  
  We've comprehensively reviewed economic inclusion and worklessness in the West Midlands. See our list of publications on economic inclusion.