Today on October 3rd, 2008, at the headquarters of the Albanian Development Fund was held an introductory meeting of the project “Community Works III”; this project which is financed by the Council of Europe Bank”, has recently started. It   is made possible through an approximately 10 million Euro Credit allocated to Albanian Government.  The project aims at improving the life quality of rural population. This will be achieved through the Encouragement of constant social economic development, improvement of communal infrastructure, strengthening of local governing, and increasing community impact in governing through participative methods. The project is comprised of two components: Designing of local development plans with the participation of local communities / Designing of environmental or tourism development plans as well as financial supporting of local infrastructure projects putting into practise the designed plans.

Local representatives, who will benefit from this project, were invited at this meeting. There were present the chairmen and the staff of Kutalli Commune, Ulez, Rrashbull, Ishem, Tregan, Dermenas, Petran, Drenove, Margegaj, Fushe Kuqe, Velipoje, Postribe, Petrele, Kryevidh, Qender Vlore, Orikum, as well as representatives of ADF. The aim of this meeting was the presentation of the principles on which this project is going to be carried out, criteria and bilateral obligations ensuring the most effective co-operation.

In his speech, the Executive Director for ADF, laid emphasis on the long experience of the Albanian Development Fund in co-operating with local government units and the new approach for investments concentrated on regions with advantageous economic resources.

The final listing of the communes which benefit from this project has undergone a selection process. The selection of the communes is based on clear and transparent criteria such as: administrative capacity, local finances and possibilities of economic development, based also on the proposals of respective Regions. ADF required that 12 Regions nationwide were to propose at least 2 communes with favourable economic and tourist resources. Having evaluated 30 proposals received from Regions, ADF selected the 16 above mentioned communes to work on the preparation of Local Development Plans and financial supporting for the priorities envisaged in these plans, focussing on economic development. The project is expected to start its ‘in field’ implementation in October 2008.