The Ministry of Construction and Regional Development aims to contribute to the improvement of the skills of specialists working for the three regional development agencies – Nord, Centru and Sud so as to attract foreign funds for financing regional projects, said Deputy Minister Veaceslav Gututui, quoted by Info-Prim Neo. According to the official, the 56 regional development projects included in the Common Document on the Program for 2010- 2012, which was approved by the Government, will be partly financed from the budget (about 500 million lei or 1% of the state budget revenues a year). The value of the projects is 1.2 billion lei so that about 700 million lei is to be attracted from foreign donors. “The Ministry is organizing seminars and workshops where agencies' employees are taught by national and international experts how to work out a financing plan and how to identify potential donors. The 56 projects included in the Common Document on the Program for 2010- 2012 were selected out of 135 projects,” Veaceslav Gututui said. Veaceslav Bulat, the head of the Urban Development Institute, said the civil society organizations are playing a special role in improving the capacity to attract foreign financing for implementing regional development projects. Moldova can attract funds from the Southeastern Europe Crossborder Cooperation Program, the Romania-Moldova-Ukraine Joint Operational Program, and the Black Sea Basin Joint Operational Program in such areas as innovation support and entrepreneurship development, environment protection, stimulation of social cohesion, infrastructure projects, stability and competitiveness. It can also benefit from the funds of over €600 million allocated for the Eastern Partnership. After the Association Agreement between Moldova and the EU is signed, Moldova will be also able to access the European structural funds. Thus, according to Veaceslav Bulat, the training of specialists and institutions in attracting such money must be a priory.