Europe / Mediterranean
European financing
The European external aid has a total amount of €51,419 billion for 2014-2020. This budget will be allocated between the six instruments as follows:
Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance (IPA): €11,699 billion
European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI): €15,433 billion
Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI): €19,662 billion
Partnership Instrument (PI): €955 billion
Instrument contributing to Stability and Peace (IfSP): €2,339 billion
European Instrument for Democracy & Human Rights (EIDHR): €1,333 billion
Geographic programme European Neighbourhood (ENI)
The new European Neighbourhood Instrument (ENI) will provide support through bilateral, multi-country and Cross Border Co-operation (CBC) programmes.
ENI support will mainly focus on:
Promoting human rights and the rule of law; establishing deep and sustainable democracy and developing a thriving civil society;
Sustainable and inclusive growth and economic, social and territorial development; including progressive integration in the EU internal market;
Mobility and people-to-people contacts; including student exchanges; Regional integration; including Cross-Border Cooperation programmes.
Main new principles:
Implementing differentiation and the incentive based approach (key aspect of the renewed Neighbourhood policy) : the EU will better differentiate levels of support by adjusting its assistance to the partner countries’ needs and progress, based on clear criteria.
Streamlining the scope of the Instrument by focussing on a limited number of key policy objectives.
Streamlining the programming process by reducing its complexity and increasing its focus.
Improving provisions on Cross-Border Cooperation (CBC) programmes.
Promoting closer links with EU internal instruments and policies to enable partner countries and their citizens to participate in successful EU internal programmes (research and innovation, youth programmes, development of SME and industrial cooperation).
Read more on european neighbourhood policy on the European Commission website: http://eeas.europa.eu/enp/
Institutions
ARLEM – Euro-Mediterranean Regional and Local Assembly
This January 21st, 2010, saw the launch, in Barcelona, of the Euro-Mediterranean Regional and Local Assembly (ARLEM), a new institutional space for dialogue for local and regional authorities at the heart of the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM). Around seventy local elected officials and representatives local authority associations of UfM partner countries were present.
The creation of ARLEM follows the request made by local and regional Mediterranean representatives during the Forum of Local and Regional Authorities of the Mediterranean, held in Marseille in June 2008, organized by the Mediterranean Commission of UCLG. They have wanted to establish a permanent dialogue with the European Union and international institutions to participate in defining and promoting policies for the Euro-Mediterranean partnership to help to develop their territories. The Assembly comprises 80 members: 40 members of the Mediterranean partners and 40 members of the European Union (including 32 members of the Committee of Regions and 8 members of European associations of local and regional active in the field of Euro-Mediterranean).
With the networks / associations working within the Euro-Mediterranean cooperation, the Mediterranean Commission will provide technical support to the ARLEM by feeding the work and dialogue.
CLRAE – The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe
The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe (CLRAE) is a forum of representatives of local and regional authorities of member States of the Council of Europe. The Congress is a political assembly composed of representatives holding an electoral mandate of a local or regional authority. CLRAE advises the Council of Ministers and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on all aspects of local and regional policy and acts in close cooperation with national and international organizations representing local and regional authorities.
Its priorities for the period 2013-2016:.
Raising the quality of local and regional democracy and human rights in Europe;
Rising to the new challenges resulting from the economic and financial crisis;
Developing co-operation and partnerships.
Parliamentary Assembly – Union for the Mediterranean
The Euro-Mediterranean Parliamentary Assembly (EMPA) was established in Naples (Italy) on 3 December 2003 and opened its proceedings on 22-23 March 2004 in Athens (Greece). It was renamed Parliamentary Assembly of Union for the Mediterranean in March 2010 in Aman (Jordan). It consist of 280 members and meets in ordinary plenary session once a year.
The Anna Lindh Foundation is a transnational organization that includes more than fortyEuro-Mediterranean countries. Its aim is to bring people together as a way to promote dialogue between cultures and respect for diversity. The Foundation is a central actor of the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership, and a facilitator of the participation of civil society in the ‘Barcelona Process: Union for the Mediterranean’. It works also as a Centre for Information and Dissemination of this initiative, and as an Observatory of intercultural dialogue in the region. The Foundation is funded in equal parts by the member states and by the European Commission and its Secretariat is located in Alexandria (Egypte).
PLATFORMA – European Platform of Local and Regional Authorities for Development
In 2007, the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) took the initiative of gathering a wide range of associations of territorial authorities—national, European, and global—within a new European Platform of Local and Regional Authorities for Development. The project was officially launched in 2008 and receives financial support from the European Commission. CEMR is in charge of the Platform’s secretariat.
Coordinating the voice of European local and regional authorities with the European institutions, PLATFORMA has three major objectives:
increased political recognition of the activities of LRAs in development cooperation;
in-depth dialogue between LRAs and the European institutions in charge of development policies;
promotion of effective decentralised cooperation for the development of partner territories, especially in partnership with civil society.
The Platform is also a bridge between European local authorities and their partners from the South to allow them to become more involved in European programs.
