Bridging the periods – keeping the momentum

Project life cycle Programme start-up

2021-2027 period is approaching its final stages. Programmes have already committed most of their resources and not that many calls for proposals are still planned. Soon most of the projects will be also finalised. At the same time many programmes have started working on their next iteration in 2028-2034 - yet this process is at a very initial stage. Such situation might create a significant gap between both funding periods, meaning that potential beneficiaries may lose interest in the programme, resulting in a slow start to the next programme. Therefore, it of utmost importance keeping the momentum between Interreg periods.

 

This workshop constitutes a spinoff event of the last year’s workshop “Maximising programme achievements and spending levels” where practitioners discussed different methods “how to reach mythical 100% of programme achievement”. As a result, it was concluded that one of the solutions is to “invest” some of the remaining resources of 2021-2027 in “seed money” projects which could on one hand cover the funding gap between the periods and on the other allow programmes to smoothly start with more projects and of higher quality submitted in the first call. However, “seed money” facility can be regarded only as example of different methods that can be used to keep the interest of the beneficiaries. Therefore, during this workshop we will work towards a joint understanding of the challenges involved with keeping the programmes alive in the eyes of beneficiaries during the “dry” period – and the different methods for keeping this momentum.