Call for Proposals
Context
Crises like the COVID-19 pandemics or the many meteorological events like floods, and geohazards such as forest fires, have had a particularly devastating effect on cross-border territories.
For border regions, it is key to respond in a coordinated manner to such events.
To combat pandemics, wildfires or floods, border regions need:
- joint cross-border spatial planning
- a coordinated response to crises situations.
To answer to this necessity, AEBR and MOT, in cooperation with the European Commission, open the present call for proposals to finance pilot actions to prepare a joint cross-border crisis management plan (lot 1) or joint cross-border spatial planning measures (lot 2).
Overall objective
The call for proposals is launched in the context of the innovative project ‘Resilient borders – Cross-Border Spatial Planning and Crisis Management Pilot Actions’ with the aim of developing resilient border regions.
Beneficiaries will receive support to initiate the implementation of pilot actions to prepare a joint cross-border plan in fields that will help border regions become more resilient to future challenges: cross-border crisis management and cross-border spatial planning.
Sub-grants up to 40,000 € are made available for the beneficiaries to prepare such plan.
What exists at the end of the project?
Beneficiaries can use the sub-grants made available to obtain plans for joint spatial planning and crises management.
Pilot actions will aim to devise agreements or joint procedures.
In the field of crisis management, examples include the preparation of detailed plans, including:
- the development of common objectives
- the development of tasks
- the identification of needed resources
- the creation of a timeline and measures for evaluation, for joint exercises and/or trainings for responsible staff or for joint planning of extreme scenarios
- drafts of common tools like guidelines or of agreements regulating general management and protection.
For spatial planning, outcomes could results in:
- the preparation or advancing towards future joint actions like strategic planning documents
- the initiation of cross-border governance and stakeholder participation to enable effective decision making
- detailed studies for the provision of cross-border public services
- roadmaps to ensure sustainable and adaptable funding for cross-border cooperation.
Who is eligible to apply?
- Public bodies (national, regional, local) from border regions of the 27 EU countries and EFTA countries
- Cross-border structures with legal personality (EGTCs, Euroregions, etc)
There must be a minimum of two applicants for every pilot action proposed by public bodies, one for each side of the border. For cross-border entities, one applicant is sufficient.
How are the beneficiaries selected?
A panel of independent experts will carry out a quality assessment of the applications.
The experts will examine the proposals’ relevance, and quality, its cross-border added value and impact.
10 cases are expected to be selected for each lot.
The European Commission will validate the selection proposed by the experts.
How to apply?
Fill in the form accessible here below by 30 November 2024.
The form must be completed in English.
Applicants are invited to use the eTranslation Tool, an online machine translation service provided by the European Commission to prepare the application English. Should the English translation be unclear, the applicant might be contacted to clarify aspects.
Applicants can download the application form for internal use in the folder with the templates linked here below.
For more information, visit the FAQ page.