Līga Vecā Liliana Olivia Lucaciu Colm McClements May 2006 Bucharest EUROPEAID/121737/D/SV/RO - Training in Project Cycle Management, Procurement and Contracting of Pre-Accession Projects and Management of EU Structural Instruments PRAG - Grants Līga Vecā Liliana Olivia Lucaciu Colm McClements May 2006 Bucharest

Good Morning! Trainers team: Līga Vecā – an expert in grant scheme management isuues, working as Deputy Director in the Contracting Authority named Society Integration Foundation in Latvia dealing with EU Phare grant scheme management and European Social Fund programme implementation. Liliana Olivia Lucaciu - an experienced management consultant and trainer being involved in all phases of the project cycle as an active actor and as a trainer for various institutions with responsibilities in the management of EU funds. Colm McClements - Team Leader of this Project, has experience as a trainer and as structural funds expert. He has worked in Ireland, N. Ireland, Brussels, and most of the new member states of the EU.

Agenda: 1st day – character of grants 2nd day – designing grants 3rd day – evaluation of proposals and choosing the best 4th day – monitoring the grant project implementation process

Learning Objectives By the end of the training, you should be able to: Understand and identify area of applicability of PRAG basic rules for grants Identify the differences of grant contracts vs procurement contracts Understand the specific award procedures and their applicability, recognise their characteristics including the steps timing; Apply Centralized, Decentralized ex-ante and ex-post controls in the context of grants; Design the framework of grant schemes; Understand and be able to undertake key stages of the grant contracts award process: Will be able to organize the evaluation process and will be aware about the key quality aspects; To apply the monitoring and financial control principles and tools of grant contracts and to understand the general principles applicable to the procurement by grant beneficiaries;

Training Approach The training will: Be participative – any questions are welcome at any stage! Be exercise based – learning by “doing” is more exciting! Involve you in team working and presenting your understanding to the others – we are here to exchange knowledge, experiences, ideas and opinions!

Lets start with a small Test! Each of you are asked to complete test containing 10 questions about grants! Time – maximum 1 minute for each question =10 minutes!

Introductions and expectations •You will be divided into 5 teams. •Each of you will be allocated to a team (A, B, C, D, E). You will have 5 minutes to introduce yourselves to the other team members (name, institution and position) and 5 minutes to discuss your own needs related to this training (agree on 4-5 group expectations) to choose one of you to introduce the team members and summary of expectations to the rest of the participants.

1.3 Overview of PRAG part 6 GRANTS document layout: main text and annexes

PRAG Practical Guide to contract procedures for EC external actions – 1st February2006 Part 6 – GRANTS Innovations in new PRAG related to GRANTS: Changes in evaluation procedure: eligibility conformity are checked only for the proposals selected for financing Reduction of requirements regarding the administrative conformity New annexes related to the reporting are introduced Simplified rules for governance of small grants to the community-base organisations (grant lower than or equal EUR 10,000)

Work with PRAG Advice: Better use the version available on internet – to be sure, that you are using final version of PRAG! Textual part: http://ec.europa.eu/comm/europeaid/tender/practical_guide_2006/documents/new_prag_en_final.pdf Annexes to the Practical Guide (E1 – E11) http://ec.europa.eu/comm/europeaid/tender/practical_guide_2006/annexes_grants_en.htm

Exercise Each team will receive the printed version of PRAG part 6 Grants - please find 2 following things there: What document in PRAG contains 4 sections: 1.Summary of the action; 2.Relevance; 3.Methodology and Sustainability; 4. Operational capacity and expertise? Who supervises the work of assessors and in what page of PRAG it is written? Which team will be the winner?