The EU Cohesion Policy is a key investment strategy aimed at reducing regional disparities and fostering smart, sustainable, and inclusive growth across the EU. It operates through national, regional, and Interreg cooperation programmes to support infrastructure, the green transition, connectivity, and social inclusion in the EU Member States, while preparing candidate countries for EU membership by building administrative capacity through Interreg and tailored training programmes.
The overall objective of the project is to prepare candidate countries for implementing cohesion policy in the lead up to and upon accession.
The project specififcally aims to
- Train staff from national administrations at central and local/regional level participating in Interreg programmes (and IPA III programmes, if staff overlaps), to reinforce their capacities for participating in and later on implementing cohesion policy programmes.
- Organise study visits (and cover related travel and accommodation costs and per diem) for short-term work experience in selected Member States’ managing or audit authorities, thereby increasing the skills for benefitting better from their participation in existing programmes and preparing future ones.