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Albania in Interreg Europe, 2 million euros for regional development

2026-01-07 22:14:11, Aktualitet CNA

Over 2 million euros for Albania, new approaches to regional policies and cooperation with dozens of European regions, these are the main benefits brought by the country's participation in the Interreg Europe program.

Through the ratification of the financing agreement, Albania strengthens its role in European interregional cooperation and paves the way for the exchange of best practices in regional development.

According to project data, the Interreg Europe Program has a total value of 493,103,338 euros for all participating countries.

The maximum contribution of the European Union to this program is 394,482,670 euros, while the co-financing of all participating states amounts to 98,620,668 euros.

The European Union co-financing rate at programme level will not be higher than 80% of eligible expenditure.

Taking into account the distribution of the European Union contribution, the number of participating countries and the implementation capacities of the Albanian beneficiaries, it is anticipated that, for the period of implementation of the financial agreement, Albania will benefit from an amount of approximately 2,000,000 euros.

Projects financed by this programme will be implemented in partnership between participating countries and require the joint involvement in the project of beneficiaries from IPA countries and European Union Member States, promoting interregional cooperation and the exchange of experiences at European level.

The overall objective of the Interreg Europe programme is to improve the implementation of regional development policies, including investment for jobs and growth objective programmes.

The program promotes the exchange of experience, innovative approaches and institutional capacity building regarding the identification, dissemination and transfer of good practices among regional policy actors.

The focus on the specific objective of Interreg, “better governance of cooperation”, means that beneficiaries can cooperate in all areas of common interest, in line with their regional needs, as long as these areas are included in the European Union's cohesion policy.

From a thematic perspective, this area is defined by the policy objectives and specific objectives of cohesion policy, while the programme recognises the need to concentrate resources on those policy areas that are most relevant and urgent for regions in Europe.

To achieve a balance between thematic breadth and strategic focus, the programme will concentrate 80% of the budget on thematic areas covered by a selection of specific objectives (“Group 1”), while the remaining 20% ??of the budget may be allocated to thematic areas covered by other specific objectives of cohesion policy (“Group 2”).

Group 1 includes thematic areas related to:

Group 2 includes thematic areas related to:

The Interreg Europe program targets regional policy actors, including national, regional and local authorities, as well as other relevant bodies responsible for defining and implementing regional development policies.

The composition of this target group is quite diverse, reflecting the diversity of institutional and geographical conditions in the partner countries.

The participating countries will set up a joint management system for the coordination, management and supervision of the implementation of the operational programme.

In the case of the Republic of Albania, the national authority for this program has been established at the State Agency for Strategic Programming and Aid Coordination (SASPAC).

The execution period of this financial agreement begins upon its entry into force or provisional application, in accordance with Article 57 of the agreement, and ends 15 years after this date./Monitor.al