Ground-setting projects (Project history)

Upon the establishment of SECI it was widely agreed that there are four priority areas which require particular attention in terms of development and which are of crucial importance for the region. These priority areas were Infrastructure, Energy, Private Sector Development and Environment. Six concrete projects considered to be of highest priority on the onset of SECI were selected as the ground-setting projects on the basis of which specific working groups were established and other region-wide activities were developed. For every project a host countries was designated which acted as coordinator of the overall project activities.

The six ground-setting projects were the following:

INFRASTRUCTURE (Trade and Transport Infrastructure Facilitation)

Border Crossing Facilitation: Actions to Overcome Operational Difficulties (Greece)

Transport Infrastructure Development along Main International Routes (Bulgaria)

ENERGY

Energy Efficiency Demonstration Zones Network in South-eastern Europe (Hungary)
Interconnection of Natural Gas Networks, Diversification of Gas Supply and Improvement of Security of Supply in Southeast Europe (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

PRIVATE SECTOR DEVELOPMENT

Financial Policies to Promote Small and Medium Enterprises through Microcredit and Credit Guarantee Schemes (Romania in cooperation with CEI)

ENVIRONMENT

Recovery Program for Rivers, Lakes and Adjacent Seas (Austria)

The kick-off activities foreseen with these six-ground setting projects were complemented with two more ground-setting projects, namely with the project for Interconnection of Electricity Grids (Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) and the project for Cooperation among Security Markets (Turkey).

With the development of the activities of SECI and the establishment of the Stability Pact for SEE, as well as with the double capacity of the SECI Coordinator also as Special Coordinator of the Stability Pact for SEE, most of these projects were further developed under the umbrella of the Stability Pact for SEE, Working Table II and implemented through the Stability Pact bodies and structures, in particular after the merger of the SECI Agenda Committee with Regional Table of the Stability Pact for SEE. Through the double capacity of the SECI Coordinator, SECI and the experts of the Project Groups acted as valuable partners for the further development and implementation of these kick-off development projects. The objective of such an exercise was to avoid duplication of efforts and thereof to achieve better coordinated regional action in specific areas of interest, which at a certain moment of the development of the two initiatives converged to a great extent.

It was also soon shown that although there are a number of priority areas, many of the outstanding economic problems within the region are closely interconnected. Thus, activities undertaken under these ground-setting projects served as the basis for the emergence of many of today’s regional entities and bodies such as for example the Business Advisory Council for SEE, the SECI Regional Centre for Combating Organised Crime, the Investment Compact, the Regional Infrastructure, the Energy and Private Sector Development a/o activities under the Stability Pact Working Table II.