In 3B meeting ESFA presented the Lithuanian progress in the ESF program

On October 6-7, 2016 Latvia hosted the 5th annual meeting of three Baltic countries for the organizations implementing the European Social Funds. Every year since 2011 this event is being organized by one of the Baltic countries. The event is dedicated to sharing the practice and the latest information on the progress of the ESF program among three Baltic countries and to strengthen the transnational cooperation among three Baltic countries. Lithuanian progress in this area this year was presented by the representatives of European social fund agency (further – ESFA).

During the 3B meeting participants mostly worked in smaller groups and discussed the issues regarding data collection on output and result indicators, ESF project results and long-term effects, IT management systems, simplified costs and sampling principle, capacity building measures and public administration reform and De minimis aid.

It is worth mentioning that during the ESF programing period in 2014-2020 in Lithuania ESFA was entrusted with the collection of data of the participants, to carry out centralized research that could indicate the long-term impact of European Union investments on Lithuanian residents who participated in the projects financed by European Social Fund projects. In Latvia, these functions are assigned to the Ministry of Finance and in Estonia, the data collection will be conducted by the National Statistics Board.

It was a pleasure to hear from neighboring countries that Lithuania is the most advanced applying the simplifications because simplifications have been used already in the previous period and numerous researches have been carried out aiming to identify new application possibilities.
Next year, the 3B meeting of the European Social Fund implementing agencies will be organized in Estonia.