Seminar on structural and cohesion funds

The Internal Audit and Investigations Directorate (IAID) within the Prime Minister's Cabinet Office, in collaboration with DG Regional Policy of the European Commission, recently held a seminar on the management, control and audit of the structural and cohesion funds.

This specialised training was targeted at auditors, controllers and financial managers in the various national agencies.

The seminar, which was held over one and a half days at Project House, Works Division, Floriana, was chaired by IAID director Pierre Pace, and Ricardo Garcia-Ayala, counsellor directorate (DG Regional Policy). A strong delegation of 10 officials from DG Regional Policy also took part.

On a national level, participants represented officials from the Planning and Priorities Co-ordination Directorate (PPCD) within the Prime Minister's office as the Managing Authority, the EU Paying Authority Directorate within the Ministry of Finance, the Department of Contracts as the Contracting Authority, the Treasury and the IAID as the Winding up Body and the European Anti-Fraud interlocutor in Malta.

Presentations on the effective management and modern audit tools in relation to the use of EU funds were delivered by the DG Regio officials and the national agencies. This activity focused on Article 5 of Commission Regulation No. 438/2001 and 1386/2002. The first day of the seminar addressed all the main elements relating to the description of management and control systems, in particular, on how the work already done by the national authorities under the Extended Decentralised Implementation System (EDIS) could be afforded a maximum value in the preparation of Article 5 descriptions.

In the afternoon two workshops were held; one workshop focused on the financial management of structural and cohesion funds while the other focused on control and audit issues.

The second day of the seminar was dedicated to issues relating to the 'control environment'; the collaboration and joint audits between the member states and the Commission, the audit strategy, timely reporting of irregularities, financial corrections and recovery of unduly paid EU funds.

The seminar proved to be a very fruitful and effective learning experience for all participants and served as an excellent tool to clear some still pending issues in the proper management, control and audit of structural and cohesion funds.

More specific and follow-up training activities are being planned for the near future, specially targeted at providing opportunities for national authorities to discuss their experiences and generate solutions to overcome any difficulties encountered in the effective management and audit of the EU Funds.