Civil society organizations and the Euro integration process

Macedonia does not use the EU funds enough

Macedonia uses the EU funds designed for financing the civil society organizations in the country very little – was the conclusion of the participants at the tribune on “Civil society organizations and the Euro integration process – access to the EU funds” that took place on 19 June at the Institute for Sociological and Political-Legal Research.

According to the civil sector in Macedonia it is difficult to access information. Therefore the lack of information i8s the main reason for not applying for most of the EU funds, thus leaving them unused. They know from experience that the organizations have had access to the EU funds usually as partners of the NGOs whose headquarters are located in some of the EU member countries.

Every year the European Commission manages and allocates about 12 billion euro-assistance. Of that, EU has provided 0, 666 billion euro-assistance for the former Yugoslav countries and Albania, most of it as part of the CARDS programme, which together with EIDHR is the most important programme for financing the civil society organizations in the region. In the period 2002 – 2004, 3 million euros were allocated in Macedonia through the CARDS programmme and 1.5 million more are to be allocated for the period 2005 – 2006 aimed for the processes of democratization and the rule of law, as well as for improving the interethnic relations.

Tanja Hafner-Ademi from MCIC stated that Macedonia’s insufficient access to the European money is to a great extent due the current socio-political context in the country, that is to the fact that Macedonia has recently become a candidate country for EU membership. However, it has not actually reflected on increasing its access to the Union’s funds yet. At the moment the EU is negotiating anew budget fr4amework for the period 2007 – 2013. The frames the EU assistance will move within in the future period will depend on the areas the Government sets as priority.

In the years to follow Macedonia can hope for the IPA programme assistance that will replace the actual CARDS programme. According TO Hafner-Ademi, Macedonia has the least number of civil society organizations involved in the European networks (twice less than its northern neighbour and seven to ten times less than the western European countries) from all the countries in the region.

In order to apply for the EU funds, noted Ademi, the domestic organizations have to know where to look for the basic information so that they get them on time. Attention has to be paid to the exchange of experiences since the procedures and the programmes themselves contain too many requests (terms) to design a programme, an application or a tender. “The civil society organization in Macedonia have already made the first step towards that, thus giving their contribution to their countries integration in the EU”, concluded Hafner-Ademi.

in Macedonia, The EU funds are managed and allocated by The European Assistance Office, the European Commission Delegation and the European Agency for reconstruction. EU focuses its support on the civil society organizations within the national CARDS programme, through the priorities for democratization and the rule of law, which means they support projects whose goal is to improve interethnic relations, the democratization process and the promotion of the civil society.

 

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