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CROATIA’S REGIONAL POLICY – IN THE PAST AND THE PRESENT The current legislative framework does not contain a single legal act systematically addressing the issues of regional development throughout Croatia. Instead, there are a number of acts affecting the regulation and implementation of regional development policy. Acts explicitly regulating the issues of development of underdeveloped areas in the Republic of Croatia should be pointed out. These include: Islands Act (Official Gazette 34/99, 32/02, 33/06), Act on Areas of Special State Concern (Official Gazette 26/03, 42/05, 90/05), Act on Hill and Mountain Areas (Official Gazette 12/02, 32/02, 117/03), Act on Reconstruction and Development of the city of Vukovar (Official Gazette 44/01, 90/05), and Act on the Regional Development Fund (Official Gazette 107/01). CROATIA’S REGIONAL POLICY – IN THE NEAR FUTURE The CARDS 2002 “Strategy and Capacity Building for Regional Development Project”, implemented with international technical assistance between December 2003 and October 2005 and financed from the EU funds, produced a draft of a National Strategy for Regional Development and an Action Plan for the first two years. It also produced a draft Regional Development Act, as well as a number of drafts for secondary legislation, such as guidelines and instructions for the establishment of a new institutional structure, preparation of development programmes, etc. The new Regional Development Act has not yet been passed, and it contains elements crucial for the management of regional development, such as partnership, programming, monitoring and evaluation. In addition, the act will prescribe a new model for identifying underdeveloped areas in order to create a better starting point for a more focused approach to solving problems of areas most affected by development difficulties. This creates a legislative framework and a foundation for the regional development that would build absorption capacity for future structural EU funds all the way to the regional level. The nature of the process of the development of the draft Act and Strategy made possible the participation of representatives of various institutions at the national level, as well as those at the local level. EU ACCESSION AND THE REGIONAL POLICY Negotiations for Croatia’s full membership in the EU were formally opened on 3 October 2005 at the first session of the Intergovernmental Conference between EU Member States and the Republic of Croatia, where the exchange of General Positions of the European Union and the Republic of Croatia took place. 20 October 2005 marked the beginning of the screening process, an analytical overview and review of the degree of harmonisation of the Croatian legislation with the acquis communautaire. The screening of the entire legislation by chapters is in process. A working group was formed for each of the chapters. The Working Groups for preparation of negotiations on the individual chapters participated in the analytical review and assessment of the harmonisation of the legislation of the Republic of Croatia with the acquis communautaire (screening), as well as in the process of drawing up of draft proposals of negotiating positions. They received support from government bodies or other bodies designated as competent authorities for individual chapters of the acquis communautaire and from the EU Coordinator of the relevant body. The Working Groups had Heads who administered their work in agreement with the member of the Negotiating Team in charge of coordinating a specific negotiation chapter. One of the more important chapters is Regional Policy and the Co-ordination of Structural Instruments. The Head of the Working Group for the chapter Regional Policy and the Co-ordination of Structural Instruments is Prof. Branko Grgić, PhD. The main negotiator is Zlatan Fröhlich, PhD. The screening process for this chapter was finished in September 2006. After becoming a candidate country and issuing a Pre-Accession Strategy, Croatia gained access to three pre-accession funds – PHARE, ISPA and SAPARD. Croatia had participated in the former two since 2005, while it started drawing funds from SAPARD in 2006, due to the more complex implementation procedure. The CARDS, PHARE, ISPA and SAPARD programmes are replaced by a new Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA) for the period 2007-2013. IPA Programme was established under Council Directive No 1085/2006, and the financial value of the Programme for a six-year period amounts to 11,468 billion Euro. On 12 June 2007, the European Commission adopted Regulation No. 718/2007, implementing the Council Regulation establishing an instrument for pre-accession assistance IPA. The main objectives of the IPA Programme are to support the candidate countries (Croatia, Macedonia, Turkey) and potential candidate countries (Albania, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Kosovo, Serbia) in harmonization of the legislation with the acquis communautaire and the implementation of the harmonized legislation; it should also help prepare them for the programming, management and implementation of the funds that will be made available to them upon accession (the structural and the agricultural funds, Cohesion Fund). In order to enhance an efficient implementation of the main objectives, the IPA Programme is organized in the following five components:
The funds allocated to Croatia under the IPA components amount to €749.83 million in the period between 2007 and 2011. The largest amount earmarked for allocation in the period leading up to 2011 is under regional development component, and amounts to €257.35 million. In order to obtain funds and implement projects under the Programme, two basic conditions must be met:
Under the IPA component III. Regional development, three strategic programmes have been prepared and accepted:
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