Grants
Grants are contracts of non-commercial nature. They are given either for the promotion of an EU policy aim or for the implementation of an action or functioning of a body.
Grants are provided to co-finance a programme. If the programme budget is less than Euro 2,000,000 or the grant is less than Euro 100,000, or the programme is due to its nature restricted to national applicants, then a local call for proposals is used. In all other cases, an international call for proposals is required. In exceptional cases, such as urgency, crisis situation, de jure or de facto monopoly, a direct award procedure can be used.
Grant contracts are signed with organisations selected through calls for proposals. The basic principle is one of competitive tendering; no projects are granted support without there having been a competitive bidding process.
Calls for proposals, under programmes agreed between the EU and the Turkish government, are publicly launched on the Internet and set out:
- target groups eligible for financing (NGOs, SMEs, local authorities etc.)
- deadline and place where applications must be submitted;
- documents needed for preparing the application (forms, other relevant documents, such as: business plan -for programmes supporting business development, statute -for NGOs etc.).
The projects submitted are evaluated according to the criteria published at the launching of the calls for proposals (e.g. organization's expertise in the given area, the relevance of the project for the envisaged sector, value for money analysis, etc.) Then the best projects are selected, announced to the public and the financing contracts are signed. It is particularly under this type of support that SMEs and NGOs can put forward innovative projects for financing.
Last update: 18.3.2008