EEA and Norway Grants support local economy

Newsroom 17/04/2012 | 12:23

Romania received almost EUR 100 million through EEA and Norway Grants over 2007-2009, and the same entities will make available a further EUR 306 million locally in the next five years.

Among the best known and most useful sources of financing are the EEA and Norway Grants. Norway Grants (the Norwegian Financial Mechanism) is a funding scheme to which Norway contributes alone, whereas the EEA Grants (the EEA Financial Mechanism) include contributions from all three EEA/EFTA states – Norway, Iceland, and Liechtenstein. In both funding schemes, Norway’s contribution makes up the most, namely 97 percent.

“The EEA and Norway Grants will make available for Romania approximately EUR 306 million in the next five years. This will make Romania the second largest beneficiary of the EEA and Norwegian financial mechanisms out of a total of 15 recipient states. The funding is earmarked to reduce social and economic disparities among the EEA countries and to strengthen bilateral relations between the donor and the beneficiary states,” say representatives

of the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Romania.

The EEA and Norway Grants will contribute to co-financing of projects in key areas of support such as environmental protection and climate change, research and scholarships, civil society, green industry innovation, justice, cultural

heritage and similar. Each of the areas will be managed by a program operator, agreed upon in the Memorandum of

Understanding. Some program areas will be managed jointly by the program operator, in most cases a Romanian public institution, and a Donor Program Partner, an entity from one of the donor states.

The areas eligible for funding under EEA and Norway Grants and their financial allocations will be settled in the Memorandum of Understanding, an agreement which is expected to be signed soon. “It will then take several months for the program operators to work out the rules and procedures of each program area. Therefore, most programs are expected to be open for project proposals at the beginning of 2013. Private companies are expected to be among the eligible applicants in some of the supported areas,” say the embassy representatives.

Norway is not a member of the EU, but it is integrated in the internal market through the European Economic Area Agreement – or the so-called EEA Agreement. As an integrated European partner, Norway and its EFTA partners are also committed to playing an active role in economic and social development in Europe. The EEA and Norway Grants were established when the EU expanded to include ten new member states in 2004. Over 2004-2009, EUR 1.3 billion was made available for project funding in the 12 beneficiary states in Central and Southern Europe, plus Spain, Portugal and Greece. Over 2007-2009, Romania accessed almost EUR 100 million through the EEA and Norway Grants. This funding period is now over, but a new one has started. Norway and the EU have reached an agreement on a financial contribution of EUR 1.79 billion for the period 2009-2014, representing a 22 percent increase from 2004-2009.

Anda Sebesi

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