Helping the region improve medium-term marcoeconomic and fiscal policy-making

Building Capacities for Policy Design and Implementation (BCPDI) is a program proposal prepared by the Center of Excellence in Finance at the initiative of beneficiaries in South East Europe, with input from the European Commission and the involvement of international financial institutions.

The aim is to build beneficiary countries’ capacities for medium-term macroeconomic and fiscal policy analysis, design, and implementation and to foster stronger internal and external policy coordination for the medium term. In particular, the program focuses on integrating the preparation processes for EC surveillance documents (Economic and Fiscal Programme / Pre-accession Economic Programme) and similar multilateral surveillance with the national budget preparation process, as well as on ensuring a consistent approach to strategic documents.

The program entails three delivery components:

• training activities
• communities of practice
• technical assistance

Under the first of these, we have prepared two projects:

• Fiscal Impact Assessment of Structural Reforms (FIASR)
• Strategic Planning and Budgeting (SPB)

For more information, please contact Robert Bauchmüller, BCPDI Program Manager, at robert.bauchmuller@cef-see.org

Connecting the region’s structural reforms to the budget process

The Fiscal Impact Assessment of Structural Reforms (FIASR) project focuses on assessing how countries in South East Europe (SEE) incorporate structural reforms into their national budgets and medium-term fiscal documents, and on identifying gaps and policy coordination issues in this process.

Assessments of beneficiaries' strategic planning and budgeting processes across the SEE region, done by the European Commission's Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs (DG ECFIN), show that there is a need to strengthen (potential) candidates' capacities, especially in line ministries, to integrate the fiscal costs of structural reforms into medium-term plans and budgets. The FIASR project is also in line with the EU’s 2020 strategy for growth, to help countries in SEE that aspire to join the European Union in implementing the acquis and in promoting economic and social reforms to fulfill the Copenhagen criteria.



FIASR objectives:

• Assessing – via country case-studies – how countries of the SEE region incorporate structural reforms into their national budgets and medium-term fiscal documents
• Identifying gaps and policy coordination issues in this process
• Generating a list of issues that can be addressed through training activities within the framework of the SPB project

FIASR is a project designed and managed by the CEF, in strategic partnership with the Ministry of Finance of Montenegro. The project is delivered with support from the SAFE Trust Fund, which focuses on Strengthening Accountability and the Fiduciary Environment and is administered by the World Bank on behalf of the European Commission and the Swiss Government.

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Addressing capacities for strategic planning and budgeting

Strategic Planning and Budgeting (SPB) is a two-year training and networking project. We have developed it at the request of our member institutions, with input from the European Commission and close involvement of international financial institutions and experts across South East Europe

This demand-driven program aims to strengthen beneficiary institutions’ capacity to design and implement medium-term macro-fiscal frameworks, and to help beneficiary institutions exchange good practice and increase regional cooperation. Raising capacities should help improve these countries’ inputs into strategic domestic and EU surveillance documents, as well as strengthen the linkages between these strategic documents.

It targets EU candidates and potential candidates covered by the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA) : Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia (new EU member), Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Turkey.



More specifically, it targets public officials at top, middle, and junior levels at institutions in charge of strategic planning and budgeting processes (mainly ministries of finance), other budget users (in particular budget-intensive line ministries) and, to some degree, central planning authorities, central banks, and macroeconomic research institutes. Its implementation started in early 2013.

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Promoting good governance as part of EU Strategy for the Danube Region

The EU Strategy for the Danube Region (EUSDR) is a macro-regional strategy adopted by the European Commission in December 2010 and endorsed by the European Council in 2011. It aims to boost development by seeking synergies and coordination among policies and initiatives across the Danube region.

Many challenges faced by the Danube region today - such as mobility, energy issues, environmental impact and security - are common to many countries of the Danube region. The EUSDR responds to these challenges by addressing four main objectives that focus on:

• connecting the Danube region
• protecting the environment
• building prosperity
• strengthening the region

EUSDR countries are: Austria, Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Ukraine, and Slovenia.

The EUSDR is defined in a Communication adopted by the European Commission and accompanied by a detailed Action Plan.

Sharing knowledge and experience through policy events and reserach activity

We promote effective policy dialogue by bringing together policy-makers, practitioners, academics, and other experts for discussions that balance theory and practice.

The key aim of our policy events and research activity is to enable the sharing of views and build on the experience of parties that have already implemented policies and reforms. Many policy events involve research efforts of longer duration and generate knowledge that is published on the CEF web site, in journals, or in book format.



Since 2006 we have in cooperation with partner institutions, addressed a number of policy topics:

• Taxation
• Pension systems
• Tertiary education
• Turbulence in global financial markets
• European health systems

Addressing capacity development needs of regional tax administrations

Supporting Capacity Development of Tax Administrations in South East Europe (SEE) project is a two-year training and networking project. The Project builds on the CEF's training program on taxation carefully linking individual activities into a coherent annual training plan.

The Project is designed to help tax administrations to deal with the challenges they face in their attempts of achieving effective and efficient application of modern risk management approaches. This in turn will allow tax administrations to achieve effective revenue management, ensure that non-compliance with tax law is kept to a minimum and thus promote voluntary compliance.

The Project will be delivered in 2 years through 14 cross-country participatory and experience-based learning and networking activities with a possible extension, subject to favorable results and availability of further financing. These will use the latest thinking and best practices that are also promoted by the international organizations including the International Monetary Fund (IMF), European Commission (EC), Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and others, and will be supplemented by SEE regional practitioners’ insights into what is required to maintain and consolidate taxpayer compliance.

The sharing of knowledge will be facilitated by challenging the participants to address the “how” and “why” questions related to the presented subject matters and to reflect on their experiences, developing personal insights and understandings. This practical orientation will enable public officials engage in cooperative learning by working in teams on problems and thus enhancing the value of practitioner-to-practitioner interaction.

The Project is designed for officials at different professional levels representing revenue authorities of Albania, Armenia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Georgia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Turkey, and Ukraine.

View the project brochure