From 2007 onwards, EU is channeling its pre-accession funding through one single instrument called the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA).

This new instrument is drawn from the European Commission’s experience with previous enlargements and the needs of candidate and potential candidate countries.

IPA’s aim is to be a bridge between external assistance and internal policies.

IPA objectives are the following:

• Support Turkey in its bid for membership, including the necessary economic, political and social reforms
• Help prepare the country for the management of structural funds

As a consequence IPA also:

• Readies Turkey for multi-annual planning
• Supports Turkey in sound financial management of EU funds

IPA will provide countries seeking EU membership with a total amount of  € 11.5  billion in the seven-year term from 2007 onwards.

The preliminary EC draft budget for 2007 envisages that Turkey could get over € 2 billion for the first four years of IPA (2007-2010).

IPA’s five components are:

• Transition Assistance and Institution Building – Component I
• Regional and Cross-Border Co-operation – Component II
• Regional Development – Component III
• Human Resources Development – Component IV
• Rural Development – Component V