Moldovan NGOs can benefit from new financing opportunities under ENPI

The new Government's intentions to establish good cooperation relations with all the countries, including the neighboring Romania and Ukraine, offer the Moldovan NGOs new opportunities for more actively participating in and implementing crossborder projects financed under the European Neighborhood and Partnership Instrument (ENPI), MP Mihai Godea said at the opening of the seminar “Engaging the Civil Society in the Programing of ENPI”. The seminar was held on October 19 under the aegis of Contact Center with financial support form Soros – Moldova Foundation. The ENPI is a financial instrument whereby the European Commission supports the neighboring countries in their plans worked out as part of the European Neighborhood Program for 2007 – 2013, Info-Prim Neo reports. “While I acted as executive director of Contact Center, I had explored with my colleagues the possibilities provided by the EU to the neighboring countries through this instrument during many years. But, owing to the tense relations with the neighbors, the Moldovan NGOs face difficulties in identifying partners for implementing the formulated projects, especially Romanian partners. Under the regulations, one of the partners must be from a EU member country. We lag behind our Ukrainian colleagues. But the barriers are now being removed and we could learn from the experience of the Romanian NGOs,” Mihai Godea said. Sergiu Neicovcen, the current executive director of Contact Center, said that all the projects on crossborder economic development and environment protection are to be presented by October 28. Several projects have been submitted for the From People to People component. The selection of projects for this component closed late in September. Valentin Burada, program director at the Romanian Civil Society Development Foundation, voiced hope that the Moldovan NGOs will manage to strengthen their project programing and monitoring capacities at a higher step than the Romanian ones and will quicker obtain access to the European funds that finance such projects. According to Iaroslav Kirpushka, director of the Cernauti Center for Reconstruction and Development, the Ukrainian NGOs finalized two crossborder projects - one on tourism development and another one on the economic development of villages located along the border. He said they are looking for partners in Moldova and expressed his hope they will find them at the seminar. The value of the projects financed by the ENPI varies between 100,000 and 1 million euros, depending on the project. The projects are trilateral and require the involvement of at least one EU representative.