July 03, 2018 - The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Montenegro awarded the participants with best presentations and programmes under the project “Western Balkans Drina River Basin Management”.
For the best projects within this programme, grants were provided, which are within the framework of a project financed by the Global Environment Facility Fund and the Special Climate Change Fund, implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in cooperation with the World Bank.
The project development objective of the Western Balkans Drina River Basin Management Project for Southeast Europe and the Balkans is to improve mechanisms and capacity of the project countries to plan and manage the transboundary Drina River Basin, incorporating climate change adaptation. The goal of this project is to increase the involvement of local communities by supporting their capacity building, as well as the private and civil sector. Winners of support through a public call for grants issued by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in early April were from six Montenegrin municipalities. The total value of the projects is 211.000 EUR, and beneficiaries of support from six municipalities will receive the support of 111.000 EUR.
During this occasion, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Agriculture and Rural development Milutin Simović addressed the participants and visitors in his introductory speech, which took place in the town of Šavnik, noting that Montenegro, through this project, has 2.72 million EUR of support at its disposal.
“This project is a new contribution to the partnership we often talk about, but we also demonstrate it on concrete projects – the partnership between local governments, the government and the civil sector, and in this project, strengthened through the partnership with GEF and SCCF, all under the umbrella of the World Bank. I am sure that this partnership, the results of the supported projects, as well as the many others that we realize together in order to develop rural areas, will contribute to achieving a better quality of life, new values, job creation and improving the quality of life at every point of Montenegro,” said Simović.
Thanks to this project, Montenegrin entrepreneurs and businesses in this sector managed to find funds for their work and as result of this, in the following period, Montenegro will get many great self-sustainable projects.
Some of these projects feature improving the state of the environment of Nature Parks in Šavnik, construction of artificial reservoirs on the basin of Korita and katun Starac, both located at mountain Sinjajevina, as well as the projects such as diversification of sport and fishing tourism on the River Tara, rehabilitation of the existing essentials in the local communities of Trubjela and Velimlje, both in Nikšić, organizing the “Bird Watching and Ecotourism” project in Žabljak, but also many projects that concern preservation and conservation of natural resources and biodiversity, mainly achieved through protection of water and fish found in this areas.
