Legal basis: Reg. 1488/96, modified by Reg. 26 98/2000
Duration: 2000-2006
Financial resources available: € 5,350 million
MEDITERRANEAN BASIN: Algeria, the Palestinian Authority, Cyprus,
Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, Malta, Morocco, Syria, Tunisia,
Turkey.
The MEDA programme is the co-operation instrument used to implement
the Euro-Mediterranean partnership.
For Turkey, Cyprus, Malta and Israel, MEDA operates exclusively
with regional-co-operation programmes.
The programme contributes to initiatives of common interest in
three areas of the EU-Mediterranean partnership:
• the strengthening of political stability and democracy
in MNC;
• the setting up of a Euro-Mediterranean free-trade zone;
• the development of economic and social co-operation, with
particular attention to the human and cultural dimensions.
The MEDA programme supports economic transition and the setting
up of a Euro-Mediterranean free-trade zone, in order to: create
employment and development in the private sector, including improvement
of the context in which enterprises operate and support to SMEs,
to open the market and promote investments, industrial co-operation
and commercial exchanges between the community and the MNC and
among the latter, and to modernise economic infrastructures.
It supports sustainable social-economic development that involves
civil society and the population in the design and implementation
of development, in improving social services, in strengthening
co-operation in the agricultural and fisheries sectors and sustainable
exploitation of marine resources, in promoting an equitable sharing
of resources deriving from economic growth and in encouraging
cultural co-operation and exchanges among young people.
It encourages regional, sub-regional and trans-border co-operation,
developing co-operation structures and improving the regulatory
framework and infrastructure projects, promoting exchanges among
the civil societies of the European Community and the Mediterranean
countries.
The activities financed consist principally of technical assistance,
training, information, the strengthening of institutions, organising
seminars, preparing reports, setting up investment projects in
micro-enterprises and SMEs, setting up and modernising infrastructures,
and actions intended to demonstrate the Community aspect of the
aid.
The Commission, in collaboration with the EIB, prepares the national/international-level
strategic documents defining the long-term objectives of the co-operation
activities and identifying the priority intervention sectors.
On the basis of these documents, three-year Indicative Programmes
are prepared at the regional and national levels, taking into
consideration the priorities identified in collaboration with
the Mediterranean partners. On the basis of the Indicative Programmes,
financing plans (usually annual) are then adopted and established
at the regional and national levels. These plans contain lists
of projects to be financed, each one of which is examined as a
component of the overall financing plan.
Further information is available at:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/exsternal_relations/euromed/meda.htm
