Тhe official ceremony for awarding of the subsidy contracts under the Bulgaria-Serbia IPA Cross-border Programme took place n the 1^st of August 2011 in Sofia (Dedeman Princes hotel, “Europe” conference hall).

Thus, the project implementation period for the 44 projects managed jointly by the partners from Bulgaria and Serbia (municipalities, business support organizations, educational, scientific, and cultural institutions, NGO’s) has officially started. The projects are related to the activities such as building and rehabilitation of small scale infrastructure (schools, tourist information centers, roads, eco paths, playgrounds, etc.) as well as organizing perspective cross-border initiatives for preservation of historical, cultural and nature sites, preservation of the environment, and solving of other relevant issues (including developing effective human resources practices).

Mr. Kiril Geratliev - Director General of the “Territorial Cooperation Management” Directorate General of the Ministry for Regional Development and Public Works of the Republic of Bulgaria and Ms. Sanda Simic - Asistant Director of Serbian European Integration Office congratulated the beneficiaries on the quality of the projects and wished everyone success in the upcoming implementation process.

Training of beneficiaries took place immediately following the awarding ceremony and was aimed at clarifying the basic principles and procedures related to project implementation. The training seminar has been divided into following six modules:

• Financial  and Technical Project Reporting
• Modification of Subsidy Contract
• Sub-Tendering Procedures
• Financial Project  Implementation and Irregularities
• Information, Publicity and Visibility
• Monitoring, Project closure and Audits

This seminar, aimed at Bulgarian lead partners, was only the first in the series of training seminars organized by the Joint Technical Secretariat under the first Call for proposals. The next two seminars are organized on the 4^th and the 5^th of August 2011 in Nis (Serbia) with help from the National Authority experts.