BCSDN member Cenzura Plus, from the 23rd – 25th of January 2017 organized an International Conference on The Role of EU Funds in Sustainability of Civil Society in the New EU Member States. The purpose of the conference was to examine how the EU funds contributed to the sustainability of civil society, what is the status of civil society in the candidate countries and potential candidates for EU membership, as the governments of these countries are preparing for the decentralization of EU pre-accession funds. The Croatian a good experience was presented, and how to avoid bad examples that have occurred in Croatia.
Representatives from CSOs and Government bodies talked about the success of pre-accession funds in Croatia, and the organizational system for the management of structural funds in Croatia, difficulties that were observed during the initial period of application, the way it affects the end users and the very purpose of those funds, the practices of other EU member states in this domain (the Slovenian experience was presented by BCSDN member, CNVOS).
The first day of the conference was dedicated to the state of civil society in the Balkans and the current stage of EU accession and organization around the use of EU funds where BCSDN members from CRNVO, Montenegro, CPCD Bosnia and Herzegovina and Civic Initiatives Serbia presented their experiences and the current state in their countries. BCSDN’s Ilina Nesik gave a regional overview of the state of civil society and the environment in which the organization work in our region. More information on the conference and the conclusions will be available here.