Interreg-Euro-Med: Third Call for Governance Projects

Deadline: 3-Nov-22

The Interreg-Euro-Med has launched its third call for governance projects.

The main goal of the Programme consists in contributing to the transition towards a climate neutral and resilient society: fighting against global changes impact on Mediterranean resources, while ensuring a sustainable growth and the well-being of its citizens. By pursuing this goal, the Programme intends to reinforce the role of the environment as a catalyst for the improvement of the quality of human life.

In order to do so, the Programme selected 3 priorities to work on: smarter, greener and better governed Mediterranean. The 2 first priorities are directly linked to thematic issues and will therefore be tackled by thematic projects related to a particular issue while the third one focuses on the quality of the governance of the cooperation among actors and will be tackled by governance-type projects aiming more particularly at improving the coordination between actors.

Thematic Projects

Governance projects are divided into 2 categories:

• Thematic Community Projects will aim at animating a community of projects to enable exchanges and synergies between projects and at favouring the technical transfer and mainstream of thematic projects’ results into the practices and policies of the Euro-MED territories.
• Institutional Dialogue Projects will aim at supporting the work of transfer and mainstream of results into the practices and policies undertaken by the Thematic Community Projects on the Euro-MED territories by liaising activities and at improving the coordination with actors within and beyond the Euro-MED area.
  • Each thematic project will fall under one of the 4 specific objectives (SO) selected by the programme:
    • Consolidating a competitive innovation ecosystem with 4helix stakeholders,
    • Supporting transition to a circular economy,
    • Improving the management of natural resources,
    • Preventing and mitigating risks, supporting energy transition and greener living areas.
  • Each of the project working under these specific objectives will operate to fulfil one of 4 more global complementary programme missions federating projects working under different SOs:
    • Strengthening an innovative sustainable economy,
    • Protecting, restoring and valorising the natural environment and heritage,
    • Promoting green living areas,
    • Enhancing sustainable Tourism (addressed transversally).

Aims

• Thematic Community Projects will specifically aim at:
  • Establishing conditions for the reuse of results, the development of synergies and the increase of coordination between thematic projects working towards the same mission by articulating a community of Interreg Euro-MED projects partners (Targeted area: Programme area / Targeted public: Programme partners of thematic projects),
  • Implementing transfer and mainstreaming strategies of Euro-MED thematic projects results in practices of public and private actors at local, regional and national levels by providing the technical support to relevant institutions (Targeted area: Programme area / Targeted public: actors of local, regional and national territories).
• Institutional Dialogue Projects will aim at:
  • Contributing to the implementation of transfer and mainstreaming strategies by engaging with local, regional and national authorities in support to the activities and achievements of the Thematic Community Projects (Targeted area: Programme area / Targeted public: actors of local, regional and national authorities),
  • Contributing to the implementation of transfer and mainstreaming strategies by engaging with European authorities/networks and with ETC managing authorities, initiatives and strategies in the Mediterranean, (Targeted area: Mediterranean area / Targeted public: transnational networks and institutions),
  • Setting up long-lasting conditions for a permanent institutional and social dialogue to bridge the transnational dimension with the local solutions, in order to contribute to territorial cohesion at the transnational Mediterranean level regarding each thematic mission (Targeted area: Mediterranean area / Targeted public: main actors including both institutions and representatives of civil society).

Funding Information

• The indicative financial allocating for this call for proposals is around 17 million euros in total (Interreg funds + national co-financing).

Expected Outputs

2 Output indicators have been selected by the Programme for Governance Axis, applying to both types of governance projects:

• Output indicator “Jointly developed solutions”
  • The indicator counts the number of jointly developed solutions between different projects or with external programme stakeholders that contribute to improve cooperation governance for the area.In order to be counted for the indicator, an identified action should include indications on the type of cooperation and engaged projects or stakeholders. A jointly developed action implies the involvement of organizations from at least two projects or one project and one external organisation in the drafting and design process of the action. Jointly developed actions, resulting from cooperation within funded projects, are needed to support better cooperation governance and to:
    • Establish conditions for synergy and coordination between thematic projects.
    • Implement mainstreaming strategies in local, regional, national and European policies in partnership with relevant institutions.
    • Support institutional coordination between regional, national and European authorities/networks and between ETC managing authorities, initiatives and strategies in the Mediterranean.
    • Set up long-lasting conditions for a permanent institutional dialogue.
  • Targeted actions refer to:
    • Actions related to the support to transferring and mainstreaming.
    • Actions related to joint advocacy/lobbying.
    • Actions related to the drafting of common solution-oriented documents contributing to achieve the Programme missions.
    • Actions related to support institutional coordination between projects and initiatives / strategies.
    • Actions related to the design of coordinated approaches.
    • Actions related to the implementation of liaising activities.
• Output indicator “Organisations cooperating across borders”
  • The indicator counts the organisations cooperating formally in supported projects. Main target groups are represented by : regional and national authorities, networks of decision makers, protected areas, energy and environmental agencies, business management organisations/agencies, Universities/research centres, NGOs/ local communities and associations, which work on enhancing synergies and coordination between thematic projects and supporting institutional coordination towards the Programme missions. Cooperation between organisations across borders is essential to ensure the optimisation of resources for greater positive impact on territories, the harmonisation of policies for a better territorial cohesion.
  • This output indicator, computing both project partners and associate partners, will allow the measurement of cooperation between organisations not only within the Programme area but also in the wider Mediterranean area, mainly with Eastern and Southern Mediterranean countries.

Eligibility Criteria

• The project meets the minimum criteria relating to the composition of the partnership: 6 partners representing 6 different countries of the Interreg Euro – MED Programme area.
• At least 1 (one) structure of the partnership is based in the EU area of the Interreg EuroMED Programme and one (1) in the IPA area.
• The Lead Partner is a public body or a body governed by public law (according to the definition of Directive 2014/24/EU).

For more information, visit https://interreg-euro-med.eu/en/call-3-governance-projects/