Pre-announcement of the Small Grant Scheme Call on fostering institutional cross-border cooperation with Ukraine

08.08.2019

Call number: GGC02

Call launching: September 2019

Call closure: January 2020

The call will be launched by the Programme Operator – the Government Office of the Slovak Republic within EEA Grants 2014-2021

The objective of the call is to find projects dedicated to fostering institutional cross-border cooperation with Ukraine related to good governance, accountable institutions, transparency and contributing to improved integrity and accountability of public administration. This Call shall give the opportunity to implement projects for grassroots initiatives, hence the opportunity for local and regional public institutions in Slovakia and Ukraine to implement the projects on a smaller scale in the area of good governance, accountable institutions and transparency.

Project grant: EUR 50,000 – EUR 200,000

Total allocation: EUR 500,000

Eligible applicants: Any public entity established as a legal person in the Slovak republic

Eligible partners:

  • Mandatory partner:   Any public entity established as a legal person in Ukraine
  • Other partner: Any public or private entity, commercial or non-commercial, as well as non-governmental organisations established as a legal person either in the Donor States[1], Beneficiary States[2] or a country outside the European Economic Area that has a common border with the respective Beneficiary State[3], or any international organisation or body or agency thereof, actively involved in, and effectively contributing to, the implementation of a project

Co-financing: Not applicable           

Financing: payments of the project grant shall take the form of an advance payment, interim payments and a final payment. The level of advance payment to projects shall be set out in the project contract.

Expected date of the project contracts signature: the expected date of the first signed project contracts will be September 2020.

Further conditions:

  1. The mandatory attachments to the Grant Application will be the Budget and the Letter of Intent or draft Partnership Agreement with the mandatory partner.
  2. This call is primarily not intended for infrastructure (hard measures)[4].

Eligible activities:

The project grant can be used for the following purposes and activities in the area of good governance, accountable institutions and transparency:

(a) networking, exchange, sharing and transfer of knowledge, technology, experience and best practice,

(b) joint seminars, workshops and trainings organized between Slovak and Ukrainian public institutions,

(c) internships realized between Slovak and Ukrainian public institutions,

(d) secondments from Ukraine to Slovakia,

(e) improvement of the level of bilingualism in Slovak and Ukrainian public institutions (e. g. language course),

(f) awareness raising and capacity building in Slovak and Ukrainian public institutions,

(g) joint strategies of public institutions in Slovakia and Ukraine provided that at least one pilot element of the joint strategy is implemented within the project,

(h) awareness raising activities  and the activities aiming at appropriate communication about the ambitions and the achieved results of the project to the general public (mandatory activity).

and (i) networking between public and nongovernmental and/or private sector entities in order to enhance the local situation.

Priority shall be given to:

  • Projects with activities that are sufficiently described, needed and appropriate.
  • Projects reflecting the recommendations of the OECD recommendation of the Council on Public integrity[5].
  • Projects to be implemented in partnership with entities from Norway/ Iceland/ Liechtenstein.
  • Projects with activities implemented on a local and/or regional scale.
  • Projects implemented by local and/or regional public institutions.
  • Projects including grassroots initiatives.
  • Projects fostering the sustainability of activities originally funded in other projects in the field of good governance, accountable institutions and transparency.
  • Projects included cooperation with a NGO active in the field of good governance as a project partner/cooperating entity.
  • Project involving cooperation with line ministries in Slovakia and Ukraine.

Eligible expenditures: except for the so-called “excluded expenditures” listed in Article 8.7 of the Regulation, all types of expenditures can be eligible, provided that they meet the conditions listed in the Call and in Article 8.2, 8.3 and 8.5 of the Regulation on the Implementation of the EEA Financial Mechanism 2014-2021.

Launch of the Open call for bilateral relations for establishing and development of the partnership for the call GGC01 and call GGC02 is planned for 19th August 2019.

The objective of this call will be the support of visits and meetings of applicants from Slovakia with their potential partners from Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. These activities can be funded under the Programme Bilateral Fund, which will provide small grants up to 5 000 EUR, covering mainly the related travel costs.


[1] Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein

[2] For the full list of the Beneficiary States consult the document Agreement on the EEA Financial Mechanism 2014-2021

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/resource.html?uri=cellar:02eed2b7-da51-11e5-8fea-01aa75ed71a1.0011.02/DOC_2&format=PDF 

[3] Ukraine

[4] For the purposes of the Programme the infrastructure (hard measures) are defined as any activities that require a building permit/a building announcement or purchase of buildings or estates.

[5] https://www.oecd.org/gov/ethics/OECD-Recommendation-Public-Integrity.pdf