The Advisory Panel of the EU Floods Recovery Programme held its fourth meeting on 15 July 2015 in Sarajevo to discuss the progress of the floods recovery efforts in Bosnia and Herzegovina and future activities.
The Advisory Panel is a key component of the governance structure of the EU Floods Recovery Programme, composed of domestic institutions responsible for floods recovery efforts at the State, Entity and Brčko District levels, representatives of the EU Delegation to BiH as the donor, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) as the Programme implementing partner.
The EU Floods Recovery Programme continues to produce good results across the flood-affected areas, and so far it has rehabilitated:
– 2094 housing units for vulnerable people to help them to return home;
– 110 public facilities to enable restoration of vital public services;
– 83 communal infrastructure objects, including 100 roads and bridges as well as water systems serving local communities.
The works are ongoing on rehabilitation of 437 housing units, 8 public buildings and 41 items of communal infrastructure.16 newly selected beneficiaries will receive emergency housing assistance in the Brcko District.
In addition, the Programme has supported 56 small and medium-sized enterprises, contributing to retention and generation of more than 2000 jobs. According to the SME interim reports from April 2015, the number of employees in SMEs that received EU financial grants increased since May 2014 from 1,861 to 2,125, thus proving that financial grants have had significant impact not just on economic recovery but also as a strengthening mechanism for economic growth in flooded areas. 700 agricultural holdings are being assisted in recovering their productive capacities and no fewer than 500 will be integrated into local and regional systems to access markets.
Melvin Asin, Head of Cooperation at the EU Delegation to BiH said: “Very good results have been achieved in close cooperation with all project partners. I would like to thank UNDP and all BiH institutions for their commitment and all local stakeholders for their support to the rehabilitation process. Increased efforts are required to strengthen flood resilience and disaster risk reduction in flood-prone areas, and to protect the newly rehabilitated schools and other public facilities, as the threat of re-flooding is ever present.”
Sezin Sinanoglu, UN Resident Coordinator and UNDP Resident Representative said “Prompt initial response and full commitment from all stakeholders enabled the timely implementation which in some cases was delivered even before deadlines. We are now discussing not only recovery, but ways of fostering sustainability of the recovery efforts and investments. We need to have a longer term outlook to explore how recovery feeds into development and into building resilience in BiH.”
The second part of EU assistance, amounting to 41 million EUR which is mainly aimed for BiH to improve resilience to natural disasters. This is the remaining part of the EU’s 85 million EUR donors’ conference pledge which will be available to BiH after the relevant domestic authorities ratify the Framework Agreement.
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