TRIALOG’s director, Christine Bedoya, was invited to speak during a Council Development Cooperation Working Party (CODEV) meeting in early February, chaired by the Slovenian Presidency.
The intervention, on old member state (OMS) and new member state (NMS) cooperation, followed an overview of development education and awareness-raising (DE/AR) given by Deepali Sood on behalf of CONCORD’s Development Education Forum.
Christine explained the purpose of TRIALOG and gave examples of activities that TRIALOG has played an active part in, to encourage cooperation between new and old EU member states.
In preparation for the Slovenian presidency, TRIALOG supported the NGDO platform through direct training and advising, but also joined them up with the presidency projects of Austria, Germany and Finland.
A second success was the additional 10 million euros allocated for DE/AR projects in NMS under the European Commission’s NGO co-financing budget line in 2006. This amount was absorbed by 22 projects involving more than 100 NGOs from NMS and in addition there were 35 NGO partners from NMS in projects presented by OMS outside the additional funds. The fantastic outcome was in great part thanks to the TRIALOG partnership fair, where many project ideas were first discussed by more than 200 participants from all Europe.
A third main area for activity encouraging cooperation between member states is CONCORD’s Enlargement, Pre-Accession and Neighbourhood (EPAN) working group, convened by TRIALOG. All NMS are represented in the group, many OMS are as well, and there is active participation from Croatian and Macedonian civil society networks. It is probably the only European working group on development issues where new member states have more expertise than older ones.
A final area Christine talked about was the existence of regional projects such as the Regional Partnership Programme between Austria and its four NMS neighbours – The Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovak Republic and Slovenia. This programme involves platforms and governments in the countries, and funds development cooperation and development education pilot projects.
Christine made concrete recommendations to the council working party:
The intervention, on old member state (OMS) and new member state (NMS) cooperation, followed an overview of development education and awareness-raising (DE/AR) given by Deepali Sood on behalf of CONCORD’s Development Education Forum.
Christine explained the purpose of TRIALOG and gave examples of activities that TRIALOG has played an active part in, to encourage cooperation between new and old EU member states.
In preparation for the Slovenian presidency, TRIALOG supported the NGDO platform through direct training and advising, but also joined them up with the presidency projects of Austria, Germany and Finland.
A second success was the additional 10 million euros allocated for DE/AR projects in NMS under the European Commission’s NGO co-financing budget line in 2006. This amount was absorbed by 22 projects involving more than 100 NGOs from NMS and in addition there were 35 NGO partners from NMS in projects presented by OMS outside the additional funds. The fantastic outcome was in great part thanks to the TRIALOG partnership fair, where many project ideas were first discussed by more than 200 participants from all Europe.
A third main area for activity encouraging cooperation between member states is CONCORD’s Enlargement, Pre-Accession and Neighbourhood (EPAN) working group, convened by TRIALOG. All NMS are represented in the group, many OMS are as well, and there is active participation from Croatian and Macedonian civil society networks. It is probably the only European working group on development issues where new member states have more expertise than older ones.
A final area Christine talked about was the existence of regional projects such as the Regional Partnership Programme between Austria and its four NMS neighbours – The Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovak Republic and Slovenia. This programme involves platforms and governments in the countries, and funds development cooperation and development education pilot projects.
Christine made concrete recommendations to the council working party:
- For future EU presidencies to include civil society organisations (CSO) in early discussions on priorities for presidencies;
- For EC and member states to support more modest criteria for new member state NGOs, not only in the development education budget line, but in others as well and to offer incentives for joint projects between new and old member states;
- For EC and member states to guarantee access to CSO in consultations on and implementation of IPA (Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance) and ENPI (European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument) funds;
- For member states to promote regional and cross-border initiatives.
Find the full text of Christine's intervention at: http://www.trialog.or.at/images/doku/codev_feb08_trialog.pdf
Photo: © Slovenian NGDO platform SLOGA
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