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ISPA is one of the three financial instruments (with Phare and Sapard) to assist the candidate countries in the preparation for accession.(Introduction to pre-accession strategy). Over the period from 2000 to 2006, a total of EUR 1 040 million a year (at 1999 prices) will be made available for infrastructure projects in the field of environment and transport.

Its main priorities in preparing the applicant countries for accession will be:

The candidate countries can propose, via the National Ispa Co-ordinator, projects in the sectors eligible to Ispa. The projects must be part of an Ispa sector investment plan adopted by the candidate countries and endorsed by the Commission.

Applications must be sent to the Ispa directorate of DG Regio. The application will be examined by Commission services and (when necessary) discussed with the applicant country. When the Commission considers the project acceptable, she will submit the project for opinion to the Management Committee, composed of representatives of the Member States.

After having received the positive opinion of the Management Committee the Commission will adopt the project and submit a Financing Memorandum for signature to the applicant country.

As noted in Agenda 2000, the applicant countries generally face much greater environmental problems than the present Member States, particularly with regard to water pollution, waste management and air pollution. Major efforts will therefore be needed, involving considerable amounts of technical and financial aid from the Union, if these countries are to catch up quickly with the 'acquis communautaire' on the environment. ISPA will concentrate on the 'investment heavy' directives, i.e. Directives that are costly to implement.

Agenda 2000 stresses the urgent need to build and repair transport infrastructure in the applicant countries and to link it to the Union's transport networks. For the countries concerned, improving their transport infrastructure is a crucial part of their economic development strategies. Developing efficient transport systems is thus an essential component in the pre-accession strategy.

Assistance should go to transport infrastructure projects which encourage sustainable forms of moving people and goods, in particular projects which are of Community interest, identified at the Helsinki and Crete conferences, and also projects which enable the countries concerned to meet the objectives of the Accession Partnerships. This will include expanding the TENs to provide good connections between the Union and the applicant countries and interconnections between national networks and links from them to the TENs.

Bringing transport infrastructure in the applicant countries up to the standards of the Union to meet the expected growth of traffic will call for major investments. ISPA will be contributing therefore to funding the development of railways, roads, ports and airports, taking into account requirements for sustainable transport and modal change.

A small part of ISPA's budget may also be used to fund preparatory studies and technical assistance. A clear link has to be shown between measures of these kinds and the projects funded by ISPA. Technical assistance will have a crucial role in guaranteeing a high level of quality in projects, in terms of both management and impact, and will allow research results to be incorporated in the relevant sector as far as possible.

Following the pattern of the Cohesion Fund for which funding is granted on a project-by-project basis, ISPA will fund the following type of measures:

They must be located in the same area or situated along the same transport corridor;
They must be objective oriented (ORIENTATED) under an overall plan for the area or corridor;
They must be supervised by a single body responsible for coordinating and monitoring.

Such projects must be of a high quality and on a sufficient scale to have a significant impact in the field of environmental protection or improving transport networks. In light of the experience with the Cohesion Fund, and in particular to avoid disproportionate administrative burdens, projects will need to have a minimum size of EUR 5 million. For the start up period of ISPA, the Commission will, however, restrict itself to supporting large projects only.
Projects are to be selected and approved on the basis of national programmes for transport or the environment, which form part of the central elements of the Accession Partnerships, the national programmes for adopting the 'acquis communautaire'. These programmes must contain strategies specifically aimed at transport and the environment, and take the transnational dimension into account when developing future trans-European networks.

Directorate F: ISPA and pre-accession measures
Luis Riera Figueras, Director
tel.: (+32)2-296 5068
fax: (+32)2-296 1096
e-mail: luis.riera-figueras@cec.eu.int

Unit F1: ISPA co-ordination activities and pre-accession measures, Bulgaria, Romania
Erich Unterwurzacher, Head of Unit
tel.: (+32)(2)299 3964
fax: (+32)(2)299 4445
e-mail: erich.unterwurzacher@cec.eu.int

Mr Dimitris Kourkoulas, Head of Delegation
Moskovska Street 9, 1040 Sofia
tel: (+359)2-933 52 40
fax: (+359)2-933 52 33
e-mail: mailto@delbgr.cec.eu.int
URL: http://www.evropa.bg

NATIONAL COORDINATORS BULGARIA
Mr. Milen Velchev, Minister of Finance
Ministry of Finance
102 Rakovski Street, 1000 Sofia
tel.: (359)2 9859 2000/2001/2002
tel./fax: (+359)2-987 0581
e-mail: m.velchev@minfin.government.bg