ENPI CBCMED underlines priorities for future cooperation perspectives in the Mediterranean

The Cross-border cooperation in the Mediterranean(CBCMED) Joint Managing Authority (JMA) has underlined priorities for future cooperation in the Mediterranean during a round table held as part of the Territorial Cooperation Med Programme event which took place on 23 September in Thessaloniki. A press release said representatives of the European Commission, local authorities (Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region), research institutes (Institut de la Mediterranée and European Institute of the Mediterranean) and Med Programme also attended the debate. The JMA tackled three key points that could be discussed in the framework of the coming mid-term review of the ENPI CBC programmes: 

·       Balanced participation between EU Member States and Partner Countries.

·       The topic of rules and procedures ensuring good governance of the programmes.

·       The increase in financial resources. Ensuring balanced participation of the Partner Countries is one of the main challenges of cross-border cooperation. Based on a preliminary analysis of the first call for standard projects, applicants from EU countries seem more active in terms of proposals submitted. 
Governance could also be addressed in the mid-term review.

The full recognition of the key role of the governing bodies

- Monitoring Committee and Managing Authority

- within the set of rules and procedures which regulates the ENPI CBC would probably foster more efficiency in the decentralized management of the Programme. 

The encouraging results of the first call (598 proposals submitted) and high-quality of the projects speak in favour of an increase of the financial resources available for cross-border cooperation. For instance, since the programmes involving Morocco and Spain did not start, the unused funds could be re-injected into the Mediterranean area. 

As a conclusion, starting from a capitalization of the experience of the ENPI CBC stakeholders and the coordination with other ongoing initiatives, in particular the Med Programme, cross-border processes can support the territorial dimension of cooperation as well as the definition of an integrated multilevel strategy in the Mediterranean. The ‘ENPI CBC Mediterranean Sea Basin Programme 2007/2013’ is a multilateral cross-border cooperation programme co-financed by the EU under the European Neighbourhood and Partnership Instrument.