One of the goals of the project is to develop a national anti-fraud strategy for Cohesion Policy and a risk management strategy that will also include anti-fraud and anti-corruption identification and mitigation measures.

By offering the opportunity to strengthen the partnership principle and build capacity of civil society groups to take part in the monitoring process of the EU funds, the project plays an important role for ensuring that spending the future EU budget is transparent, and civil society has an important role to play in how the spending is allocated.

Trainings to date had excluded civil society groups that are not already part of official monitoring committees, meaning that only those already ‘in the know’ could participate, limiting the possibility to build others’ capacities. The importance, then, of the present technical assistance project is that it enables a greater role for civil society in ensuring EU funds deliver on their stated intentions.