Nine representatives from eight countries contributing to Eastern Partnership Technical Assistance Trust Fund (EPTATF) have attended the EPTATF Contributors’ Committee meeting that took place in the EIB Headquarters in Luxembourg on 21 June, 2016.
Contributors– Austria, France, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Sweden and the UK - have approved the following EPTATF projects with total amount of EUR 4.7m, that aim to support EIB activities in Eastern Partnership countries1 as well as facilitate capacity building in the region:
- Armenia: Technical Assistance in support of Rural Framework Loan
- Ukraine: Implementation support to Early Recovery Framework Loan
- EPTATF Internship programme, Phase III
Words of appreciation of EPTATF support were said by the representative from one of beneficiaries, Ministry of Environment of Moldova. Ms Inga Podoroghin shared the valuable experience technical assistance grant from EPTATF that was used to finance comprehensive studies related to flood risk assessments in the country. Those studies were completed in 2016 and set the basis for national strategy for flood protection and provided flood risk maps for prevention purposes.
The EPTATF has presented its pipeline and latest annual report (“EPTATF Annual Report 2015”), underlining a very positive indicator for the Trust Fund’s activities in 2015 – six EPTATF technical assistance projects supported the EIB lending amounting to EUR 848m.
As a conclusion, the next EPTATF Contributor’s Committee meeting was pre-scheduled for 16 November, 2016.
1 Eastern Partnership countries eligible for EPTATF support are: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine