State-of-play of Managing Authority in Albania. Grigor Gjeci Head of the MA May 27 th, 2015

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1 State-of-play of Managing Authority in Albania Grigor Gjeci Head of the MA May 27 th, 2015

2 Structure of the Managing Authorities Secretary General Directory of Programing and Evaluation of Rural Policies MA Sector of programming Sector of Monitoring, Coordination and Publicity

3 Measures IPARD II programme will be adopted in June 2015 by the IPA Management Committee as a first step in the entrustment process. The IPARD II will start with the following measures: Package 1 Investments in physical assets of agricultural holdings; Investments in physical assets concerning processing and marketing of agricultural and fishery products; Farm diversification and business development; Technical assistance

4 Measures (2) It is planned to start additional measures later during the IPARD II implementation Package 2 Advisory services; Preparation and implementation of local development strategies Leader approach; Agri-environment climate and organic farming

5 IPARD II MC Establishment and Representation According to the article 53 of the FWA Monitoring Committee should be Established at latest 6 months after entering in force of the first Financial Agreement. Based on Stakeholder analyses conducted by the MA, a balanced participation between the government bodies and non governmental, environment and social-economic partner is proposed Draft structure of the IPARD II MC has been prepared and discussed within the MARDWA and is ready to be sent to DG Agri for consultation Rules of procedure of MC have been drafted following DG Agri templates

6 Establishment of the IPARD II Monitoring Committee The following organizations will be invited to be members of the IPARD II MC: 1.Public authorities and bodies - Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development and Water Administration (MARDWA) MA, IPARD Agency, sectoral directorates, extension services; Line Ministries Ministry of European Integration (NIPAC), Ministry of Finance (NAO/NF), Ministry of Environment, Ministry of Social Welfare and Youth, Ministry of Economic Development, Trade and Entrepreneurship, Ministry of Urban Development and Tourism, Ministry of Local Government, Institute of Statistics. Regional and local authorities represented by the Association of Albanian Municipalities. Non-Governmental organisations in the in the field of agriculture and rural development, Branch associations in food processing industry, Albanian Tourism Association, Albanian Women Association, Union of Farmers Associations in Albania, etc. Bilateral and multilateral donor organisations, such as the World Bank, UNDP, USAID, GIZ, Italian Development Cooperation Office, etc. Other partners, such as Commercial Banks and micro-finance institutions, academic and research institutions, etc. Chairperson Minister of MARDWA Representatives of the Commission, Operating structure, NIPAC and NAO participate in advisory capacity Number of the NGO at least equal to the number of the representatives of the state institutions with voting right

7 List of Eligible Expenditure LEE for the measure Investments in physical assets of agricultural holdings and LEE for Investments in physical assets concerning processing and marketing of agricultural and fishery products ; are prepared and agreed with the IPARD Agency. The drafts will be sent to DG Agri for consultation. LEE for Farm diversification and business development, is under preparation.

8 MA Manuals of Procedures Manuals of Procedures(General manual and Operating Manual) are in process of revision and will be finalised in June 2015; NAO and other decentralised structures are in the process of filling additional posts; Self-assessment process is planned Submission of documents for entrusting budget implementation tasks (September 2015);

9 Use of Technical Assistance measure Preparation of preliminary accreditation documents for implementation of the measure for TA such as: Defining of suitable approach for implementation of TA measure; Preparation of draft Manual of procedure for TA measure including appropriate control documents such as Checklists for TA; Preparation of draft Working registers for recording all relevant data regarding implementation of TA (number of calls, contracts signed and payments executed etc.)

10 Use of Technical Assistance measure Propose necessary legal ground for regulating the relations between MA and PA (draft MoU) for implementation of TA measure; Preparation of draft Guideline for TA measure; Recommendations for further necessary steps to be undertaken for accreditation of TA measure; Necessary provisions update of MoU between PA and MA to integrate the requirements for implementation of TA measure;

11 Capability of advisory services to advice on IPARD The extension service is organised and managed by MARDWA; Extension service provides information, advice and training to farmers and agri-business; Five Agricultural Technology Transfer Centres (ATTC) are set up, responsible for conducting applied research in various fields of agriculture; Main problems faced by the public Extension services are: the limited number of extension specialists and their engagement with a lot of tasks outside their specific field;

12 Capability of advisory services to advice on IPARD the insufficient financial support in agricultural information centres to accomplish the extension activities; high average age of extension specialists and their limited IT skills; limited capacities in farm management, marketing and business planning, and in providing support and technical assistance to off-farm subsectors (i.e. processors, wholesalers, retailers); low/insufficient outreach, especially in mountainous/remote areas; limited knowledge of the functioning of value chains (from production to marketing

13 Access to funds for private cofinancing The banking sector dominates the financial sector in Albania and accounts for 97% of the financial system assets. Banks are the main players in channelling funds from lenders to borrowers. Currently all banks are private and predominantly foreignowned. The banking sector in Albania is dominated by five large banks. The supply of bank credit to agriculture is constrained by structural problems of the sector including small size of farms, ageing of farm population which makes long term loans more risky, lack of assets to be offered as collateral, underdeveloped land market, lack of information regarding the applicants financial standing, etc

14 Access to funds for private cofinancing In addition to the local banks and branches of foreign banks, there were 134 saving and credit associations and 2 unions of saving and credit associations, and 9 non-bank institutions licensed by the Bank of Albania. Microfinance institutions have expanded into both rural and urban markets.

15 Concluding Mo U between the MA and PA and NAO Memorandum of Understanding between the NAO/national fund and the Management Authority( including attached guidelines, template documents and / reports, timelines etc); Memorandum of Understanding between the Paying Agency the Management Authority( including attached guidelines, template documents and /reports, timelines etc)

16 Preparation for the calls The Managing Authority, in agreement with the IPARD Agency, shall each year draw up an Annual Work Programme of Calls for applications (AWP), indicating the number of calls, time for launching and deadlines for submission of applications of each call, Drafting the indicative budget of each measure under each call for applications

17 Monitoring systems Programme monitoring aims to ensure the effectiveness and the quality of the implementation; The progress, efficiency and effectiveness of the IPARD II programme shall be measured by the indicators; presented in the Programme for the baseline situation, inputs/financial execution, outputs and immediate results of the operations; The data on monitoring indicators will be collected by the IPARD Agency and inserted into the Management Information System (MIS); MA will collect, aggregate and analyse information / data on indicators, received from the IPARD Agency, report and provide for follow-up actions.

18 Other current points of priority The accreditation of the TA measure is of higher importance for the proper implementation of the programme. On the other hand, the accreditation process of this measure in the period took a long period and only few countries were successful. There is a need of strong guidance on behalf of DG Agri for the accreditation process of this measure by issuing guidelines, templates documents etc and by providing proper training.

19 Thank you for your attention!