The realisation of the project ‘Support to Participation in EU Programmes’, whose final beneficiary is the Ministry of European Integration, started on 25 February 2019, as part of the 2014 IPA National Programme. The general goal of this project worth EUR 1.5 million is to support the preparation of the Republic of Serbia for EU accession and to improve the understanding of EU procedures and its fundamental values, which would lead to Serbia’s greater participation in EU programmes.The aim of the project is to improve the absorption of funds from EU programmes by strengthening the management capacities of public administration and potential beneficiaries, with a goal to achieve the following three results:
- Strengthening the capacities of national contact points, relevant public administration bodies and potential applicants, and the preparation of institutions for participation in EU programmes;
- Preparation of a comprehensive analysis of the Republic of Serbia’s participation in EU programmes;
- Support to national contact points in implementing activities related to the visibility of EU assistance.
The Ministry of European Integration is also responsible for the overall implementation of the project, envisaged to last 24 months.
EU programmes represent a series of integrated measures intended for strengthening cooperation between EU member states and candidate countries in various areas. The programmes are financed from the EU common budget with funds intended for the development of various priority areas: environmental protection, energy, transport, development of entrepreneurship, competitiveness etc.
As an EU candidate country, Serbia participates in the following programmes: Horizon 2020, Programme for the Competitiveness of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises – COSME, Erasmus , Creative Europe, Europe for Citizens, Fiscalis 2020, Customs 2020, EU Programme for Employment and Social Innovation, Rights, Equality and Citizenship Programme, EU Health Programme III, EU Civil Protection Mechanism, and Connecting Europe Facility. EU programmes financially support high-quality projects of EU member states and candidate countries. The main objective is larger representation of projects from Serbia and better absorption of EU funds. The precondition is the improvement of administrative and management capacities of institutions and bodies, providers of support to potential applicants, so that they could correctly define an appropriate programme and prepare the project proposal in the best possible way.
To that end, the project ‘Support to Participation in EU Programmes’ provides support in:
- Raising awareness, dissemination of information and knowledge through training courses, seminars, webinars and camps for project development, providing full support to national contact points and potential applicants;
- Improving communication and coordination between Serbian institutions responsible for project management, national contact points and potential participants in projects and programmes;
- Developing online tools, materials for training courses and seminars, and providing continuous information to stakeholders/partners in direct communication for the purpose of achieving an optimal level of information;
- Analysing and evaluating Serbia’s participation in EU programmes so far, and defining recommendations for participating in the following seven-year cycle of EU programmes.
Through continuous training and improvement of capacities, all participants in the process of preparation and implementation of projects for EU programmes will acquire effective knowledge and gain experience from the best practices, which they will be able to use in achieving the main goal – increasing the absorption of EU funds by participating in as many EU programmes as possible.
More details on the project ‘Support to Participation in EU Programmes’ and online tools for training and support to project preparation can be found on the project’s website.