3.3 Main Projects - Application and Selection Procedure
1. Admissibility, Eligibility and Quality assessment by the Joint Secretariat
The first stage of the eligibility assessment is an admissibility check, normally within the first two weeks. If the application is deemed to be incomplete, the Joint Secretariat will allow the Lead Partner applicant to complete the application. Should this not be possible, the application is deemed inadmissible.
Project applications will then be checked against the eligibility criteria to ensure that they fulfil the technical requirements of the Programme. Details on the eligibility criteria can be found in chapter 3. An application could be deemed ineligible at this stage if it does not meet the eligibility criteria.
Eligible applications will then undergo a quality assessment, looking among other things at the fit of the project with the specific objective, a coherent and logical setup, a budget that presents value-for-money, and a suitable partnership.
2. Regional Advisory Group (RAG) Appraisal
RAGs will conduct an appraisal of the application, considering the project idea, and the application in general from a regional perspective, potential synergies with other funded projects, as well as the suitability of the partnership. The RAGs will make recommendations to the Joint Secretariat on whether the requests for funding should be supported.
3. Joint Secretariat completes Assessment and prepares Decision Proposal
On the basis of their assessment and the recommendations from the Regional Advisory Groups, the Joint Secretariat will prepare proposals for decision to the Monitoring Committee.
4. Selection of projects by Monitoring Committee (MC)
A recommendation for the approval or rejection of the project application will be made by a Monitoring Committee, made up mainly of representatives from each of the participating partner countries, on the basis of prioritisation against the selection criteria, which can be found in chapter 3.
A project will be given a recommendation by the Monitoring Committee in line with one of the following categories:
Approval
Non-Approval
Following the MC meeting, a member of the Joint Secretariat will inform the Lead Partner of the MC’s recommendation. The Lead Partner will be responsible for communicating the MC’s recommendation to the other project partners. In circumstances where the MC has formulated a number of conditions to be addressed during the project implementation, reference to these will be made in the Grant Letter.