Twinning Bulgaria: Improving the Processes of Coordination, Management and Implementation of European Structural Instruments

In October, Formez experts conducted a mission to Bulgaria for planning the activities to be implemented under the Twinning project: “Improvement of the Coordination, Management and Implementation Mechanisms of EU Structural Instruments”.
The objective of the project is the strengthening of administrative and institutional structures at local, regional and national level, in order to ensure effective participation of Bulgaria in European cohesion policies. The project beneficiary is the Bulgarian Ministry of Finance, the Italian leading team is the Department for Economic Development and the foreign partner is the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Finance. Formez experts’ mission was carried out in the sphere of the activities aimed at strengthening:
2.3. the capacity of the Managing Authority of the Structural Funds in implementing information and publicity campaigns on Operational Programmes
3.1 the coordination activities between the Central Coordination Unit (CCU) and national, regional and local structures. Furthermore, this component implies both the transfer of Italian and Spanish experiences in the development of coordination processes for supporting communication activities as well as training modules on communication strategies
2.1 the capacity of the institutions involved in the effective management of operational programmes, including financial and management control, State aids, public procurement and on-site checks
2.4 the capacity of the Intermediary Bodies involved in the various Operational Programmes for the effective management of priorities and measures which were selected in terms of State aids, public procurement and horizontal themes.
The goal to be pursued by the expert who worked on activities 2.1 and 2.4 was the conclusion of the work which commenced in July and led to the definition of a training plan for the Managing Authority and the Intermediary Bodies. The plan provides indications about the content of the training activities, the types of participants and the methods to be used for training. Another aim of the mission was the definition of a time schedule of the activities to be carried out. Under actions 2.3 and 3.1, the target was to assess the needs through interviews to the heads of Information and Publicity of the Operational Programmes (OP) and the drawing-up of a draft work plan. The latter will alternate activities of secondment for the heads of the OP information and publicity actions on priority themes as well as classroom training, for the purpose of enhancing the coordination capacity of the Central Information Office. Moreover, the organization and sharing of experiences on themes of interest of the Bulgarian counterparts, were required.