Skopje, 5 March 2023

The launch of the three-year Regional EU-funded Programme aimed at supporting central banks and banking supervisory agencies in EU candidate countries and potential candidates from the Western Balkans, has also been marked with a special newsletter and a video, prepared by Banca d’Italia as the host of the kick-off event, held in September 2022.

The Regional Programme is in the amount of Euro 3 million, provided by the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA) and is the follow-up to a similar initiative and project activities that were successfully completed in 2021.

“The success of the First Regional Programme creates big expectations from the follow-up, where the joint trainings are extended to additional areas of cooperation, which are now 6” says in the video Daniela Parat Jovanovska, Expert Adviser in the National Bank, adding that the bilateral measures are tailor-made and provide room for an in-depth and targeted improvement in the areas that are selected by the central banks themselves. 

The Programme is coordinated by the Deutsche Bundesbank, and it includes other 19 national central banks of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB) and the European Central Bank (ECB). Through joint trainings and bilateral activities, the Programme will contribute to the further strengthening of the institutional capacities of the central banks that are final beneficiaries, especially by improving their analytical tools and policies and by transferring the best international and European standards to the national practices. The beneficiary institutions are: the Bank of Albania, the Central Bank of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Banking Agency of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Banking Agency of Republika Srpska, the Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo, the Central Bank of Montenegro, the National Bank of the Republic of North Macedonia and the National Bank of Serbia.