Another EUR 5.5 Million for Civil Sector and Local Self-Governments Provided by Sweden

Sweden has increased the monetary help for the development of the civil sector and local self-governments in Serbia by more than EUR 5.5 million, the Embassy of Sweden in Belgrade announced today.

Of the total amount of the additional funds, EUR 3 million pertains to civil society organizations, EUR 1.2 million to support in developing local self-governments and EUR 1.36 million to improving public procurement procedures.

– The civil society has an important role in monitoring and promoting reform efforts. Through additional funds, Sweden continues its years-long cooperation with the Belgrade Open School, the Olof Palme Center and the Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability in order to support the reform efforts of the Government of Serbia and promote democratization, transparency and accountability, as well as EU integration – says Ambassador of Sweden to Serbia Jan Lundin.

According to him, Sweden’s continued support to civil society organizations in Serbia amounts to around EUR 3 million.

Furthermore, having recognized the importance of the development of local self-governments in Serbia, Sweden has also approved additional monetary support to the development of local administration through the project of “Support to Local Self-Governments in Serbia On the Road to EU Accession”, carried out by the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities. The total value of the additional agreement is around EUR 1.2 million.

He adds that, considering that public procurement procedures have a substantial share in the economy of Serbia, it is very important for not just the legislation system, but also the system and the way of carrying out public procurement procedures, to improve, so as to ensure a greater degree of competitiveness, the press release says.

– That is why the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) has signed the agreement with the National Association for Local Economic Development (NALED) on the support in executing the project of “Efficient Public Procurement in the Service of Economic Development” with a total budget of EUR 1.36 million – the press release says.

The head of the department for development cooperation at the Swedish Embassy, Ola Andersson, points out that the aim of the project is to promote democratic governance through supporting the establishment of a transparent and responsible system of public procurement procedures and supervision over them, improvement of public finance management and stimulating the growth environment based on the private sector.

He added that special attention would be paid to the introduction of ecological criteria to the public procurement procedures, in order to develop the capacities for the so-called “green procurement procedures”, which entail energy efficiency, as well as training the officials for public procurement procedures on a local level.

As one of the biggest bilateral donors, Sweden is helping Serbia in its process of accession to the EU and meeting the standards with more than EUR 12 million a year, the embassy announced.

Beogradska otvorena škola

NALED Beograd

SIDA Stockholm

Ambasada Kraljevine Švedske Beograd

Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency

SIDA

Olof Palme Center

Center for Research Transparency and Accountability

Jan Lundin

aid to development of civil sector

efficient public procurement in the service of economic development

Ola Andersson

development of civil sector

development of local self governments

upgrade of public procurement procedures

training of officials for public procurement procedures on the local level

green procurement procedures