Opening the new financial framework for the Western Balkans countries, called Instrument for Pre Accession (IPA), the European Union aims to help candidate and potential candidate countries to face the challenges of the European Integration, to implement the reforms needed to fulfill EU requirements, progress in the Stabilisation and Association Process and to lay the foundations for fulfilling the Copenhagen criteria for EU membership.

With the objective to answer the growing needs of partners to improve and acquire knowledge on development of projects which could be financed from available EU funds, BSC Zenica and SPARK organised a two-day training for partner institutions from Bar, Bitola, Kragujevac and Zenica. Training was provided by Mr. John Stringer and expert specialized in the development and management of projects financed by the European Union. 




In general training helped participants to:

1. Understand the IPA and main characteristic of new EU financial framework
2. Understand other relevant EU funding opportunities
3. Improve the knowledge on how to access different documents, information relevant for applying to different EU funds
4. Understand the complete logic and necessary actions in order to submit successful project proposal – “From idea to contracting” 

Representatives from following partner institutions participated at EU project development and funding opportunities training:

From Bitola:

University St Kiliment Ohridski
Technical faculty
Regional Chamber of Commerce
Agency for the Promotion of Entrepreneurship of the Republic of Macedonia

From Bar:

Municipality of Bar
Faculty for tourism and hotel management
Montenegro Business Alliance
Association of agriculture producers Mrkojevic
The employment bureau Bar
Secondary school of economics

From Kragujevac:

Association of private entrepreneurs Sumadija
General Association of entrepreneurs Sloga
Regional Chamber of Commerce
Business Innovation Center
University of Kragujevac
Municipality of Kragujevac
Regional Agency for Ecomonic Development of Sumadija Region
BSC Kragujevac

From Zenica:

Chamber of Economy
Economic Development Agency ZEDA Zenica
Regional Development Agency REZ Zenica
Business Service Centre of Zenica-Doboj Canton
Department for Economic Relations at Zenica Municipality
Zenica University