Special Report No 6/2003 concerning twinning as the main instrument to support institution-building in candidate countries together with the Commission's replies
Date: 2003-04-10
Institutions: European Court of Auditors
Subjects: accession to the European Union, administration of the Institutions, administrative structures, assistance in training, project evaluation, report, twinning

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Official Journal of the European Union

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concerning twinning as the main instrument to support institution-building in candidate countries
together with the Commission’s replies

SPECIAL REPORT No 6/2003

(pursuant to Article 248(4), second subparagraph, of the EC Treaty)

(2003/C 167/02)

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Paragraph

Page

SUMMARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

PROJECT OVERVIEW AND BUDGETARY SIGNIFICANCE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

THE COURT’S AUDIT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

ACHIEVEMENT OF RESULTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Concept of ‘guaranteed’ results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Limited achievement of ambitious objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Concern for sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Reasons for limited achievements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

EXTERNAL EVALUATION IN 2000 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

CORRECTIVE ACTION BY THE COMMISSION AS A RESULT OF THE EXTERNAL
EVALUATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

CONTINUING STRUCTURAL PROBLEMS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Administrative complexity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Inefficient procedures from needs assessment up to project realisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Complicated payment systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Over-emphasis on twinning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Extended use of twinning for mandated bodies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Automatic use of twinning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

TWINNING AND NEW ACTION PLANS 2002 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

A positive initiative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Limited achievements of ambitious objectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Improving the delivery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Making twinning quicker and less complex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

I-VII

1-7

8-11

12-15

16-24

17-18

19

20-22

23-24

25-26

27-32

33-52

33-44

34-36

37-44

45-52

46-48

49-52

53-55

56-65

56-58

59

60

61

Choosing twinning more selectively . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

62-63

Building on knowledge and experience . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Outlook . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

64

65

Annex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

The Commission’s replies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

22

23

25

25

27

27

27

28

28

29

29

30

30

30

30

31

31

32

33

33

33

33

33

34

34

34

34

35

37

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SUMMARY

I.
A strong administrative capacity (institution-building) is vital for the candidate countries of central and
eastern Europe in order to be able to adopt and implement Community law (acquis communautaire), one of the
criteria for accession. The Commission launched twinning in 1998 as the main instrument to assist candidate
countries in strengthening their administrative capacity. Twinning involves the provision of national experts
by Member States to candidate countries. Up to February 2002, 503 twinning projects in total had been
approved, with an overall budget of 471 million euro.

II.
The Member State administrations and public institutions have unique knowledge and specific experi-
ence concerning the implementation and enforcement of Community law. The introduction of the twinning
instrument in 1998 provided for transferring knowledge and experience from the public sector of the Member
States to the candidate countries. Twinning is therefore a positive initiative by the Commission to assist can-
didate countries in acquiring the capacity to adopt, implement and enforce the acquis communautaire (1).

III.
The twinning projects acted as a catalyst in setting the candidate countries’ reform in motion, bringing
together specialists from Member States and candidate countries’ administrations and promoting the adop-
tion of the acquis communautaire through legislation. However, progress was rather less in implementing and
enforcing the acquis. The objectives stated in the twinning covenants (the so-called ‘guaranteed’ results (2) were
often unrealistic, and could often be achieved only partially within the project period. In practice it proved
overly optimistic to expect that a fully functioning, efficient and sustainable candidate country organisation
would exist in a given field after one twinning project, the average duration of which is 18 months (see para-
graphs 16 to 22).

Twinning is a complex activity involving a variety of functions and participants (the national experts
IV.
or Pre-Accession Advisers (PAAs), different Member State and candidate country administrations and the Com-
mission (Brussels and Delegations)). The desired results can only be achieved if all parties perform as required.
The audit showed that the limited achievements are in general due to a combination of factors involving all
parties (see paragraphs 23 to 24):

— setting of unrealistic objectives,

— poor candidate country commitment and ownership,

— management shortcomings at the level of Member State administrations and the Commission.

Twinning is a relatively new approach in delivering institution-building assistance to the candidate
V.
countries. A positive feature of it is the fact that the Commission assumed its responsibility for organising a
learning process and as a result introduced many changes to improve the instrument (see paragraphs 25 to
32). However, a negative side effect was increased complexity as different sets of rules from those applying to
older ones had to be applied to new projects (see paragraph 43).

VI.
The interaction of the numerous public administrations involved in twinning created administrative
complexity, diminishing efficiency and effectiveness. Too much time is spent on purely administrative issues,
to the detriment of the main task, namely advising candidate countries on institution-building. The still lengthy
periods between needs assessment and project realisation, as well as the highly complicated payment systems,

(1) The entire body of EU law as expressed in the treaties, in the secondary legislation and policies of the Union, as well as

in the jurisprudence of the European Court of Justice.

(2) The Commission established the term ‘guaranteed’ results in order to underline the objective of a concrete and fully
operational outcome in a particular field. However, there are no financial consequences in the case of only partial suc-
cess or failure in reaching the ‘guaranteed’ results.

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are two of the more significant of the current difficulties (see paragraphs 33 to 44). There was also a tendency
to over-emphasise twinning at the expense of other mechanisms that are eligible for support. This sometimes
resulted in a departure from the instrument’s original aim and in an insufficiently selective use of twinning
(see paragraphs 45 to 51).

VII.
While the instrument certainly contributed towards strengthening the candidate country’s institutional
and administrative capacity with regard to the requirements of EU accession, there is considerable room for
further improvement. It is recommended that (see paragraphs 60 to 64):

— the rate of delivery should be increased by a real results-orientated approach. The basic components
needed for effective implementing capacity should be better identified and the objectives for individual
projects should be defined more realistically and precisely,

— the different stages, from needs assessment up to project realisation, should be completed more quickly

and be less bureaucratic,

— payment procedures should be simplified and accelerated,

— the use of fixed-price or lump-sum contracts requiring specified deliverables should be considered,

— the use of twinning should be the result of a conscious choice between different instruments: the Com-
mission should increase its efforts to ensure the most appropriate mix of the different instruments avail-
able for institution-building,

— the Commission should create a PAA network to safeguard the store of specific knowledge, to spread

good practice and to reduce the risk of errors recurring.

INTRODUCTION

1.
The ability of the candidate countries of central and east-
ern Europe to adopt and implement Community law (acquis com-
munautaire) was established at the European Council in Copen-
hagen in 1993 as one of the criteria for accession. Twinning,
introduced in 1998, is one of the means by which the Union has
sought to assist the Candidate countries in strengthening their
administrative capacity.

2.
In November 1999, the Commission adopted new guide-
lines for the implementation of the PHARE programme for the
period 2000 to 2006, in which PHARE support is targeted on
two main priorities:

The main instrument for institution-building is twinning.
4.
Twinning involves the provision by public administrations of
Member States of the EU of seconded experts to the candidate
countries on a full-time and long-term basis (1). The overall pur-
pose is to help candidate countries to put in place or strengthen
the institutions required to incorporate the acquis communau-
taire (2), through a transfer of knowledge and experience from
Member State administrations and public institutions. While the
long-term national expert or pre-accession adviser (PAA) (3) forms
the core of a twinning project, the twinning package may also
include additional short or medium-term experts and the supply
of training and in duly justified cases small items of office equip-
ment (unit cost below 5 000 euro). The candidate country chooses
the twinning partner.

(a)

institution-building (around 30 % of PHARE resources);

(b)

investment support (around 70 % of PHARE resources).

The first priority, institution-building, is defined as the
3.
process of helping the candidate countries to develop the struc-
tures, strategies, human resources and management skills needed
to strengthen their economic, social, regulatory and administra-
tive capacities. PHARE contributes to the financing of institution-
building in all sectors.

(1) The Commission has established the rule that Member State experts
should be statutory civil servants or acting civil servants (Twinning
Manual, part A, Article 5.3.2). However, certain mandated non-
administrative bodies, usually those to which a Member State has del-
egated its powers, may also provide twinners.

(2) See footnote 1.
(3) PAAs assist the administration or other government bodies in the
Candidate Country in the context of a pre-determined work pro-
gramme.

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Key elements of the twinning instrument are the twinning
5.
covenants signed by candidate countries and Member States and
endorsed by the Commission to make them eligible for funding
by PHARE. These covenants contain the specific objectives of the
relevant twinning projects which, in the fields selected, cover a
wide range of issues (such as organisation, training, legislation,
information, technology, etc.). They constitute the legal docu-
ments which commit both parties to achieving the results desired
through the secondment of Member State experts to candidate
country administrations.

The management of twinning is complex. The Commis-
6.
sion is responsible for the overall management and financing of
the twinning instrument, and its Delegations also have a role in
preparing and monitoring individual covenants (see Diagram 1).
However, the main responsibility for implementing the individual
covenants has been delegated to the Member States and the can-
didate countries.

Diagram

Main steps and responsibilities in twinning

Main steps in twinning

Main management responsibilities in twinning

CC partner

MS partner

Delegation

CFCU

HQ twin-
ning team

X

X

X

X

X

X

(1)

X

X

X

X

X

X

X
X

X

X

X

X

X

X

X Subject
to 15

1
2

3

4
5
6
7
8(a)

8(b)
9

10

11

Programming
Circulation of fiches, reception of
offers, dispatch to Delegations
Dispatch of offers to beneficiaries,
organisation and management of selec-
tion meetings
Selection of partners
Communication of selection to HQ
Communication of selection to MS
Drafting of covenant
First assessment of covenant and
presentation to Steering Committee
Final approval of covenant budget
Management of Steering Committee:
Reception of covenants, dispatch to
geographical team/line DG,
organisation of meetings, dispatch of
decisions, minutes
Final assessment of covenant, drafting
of decision, presentation to Committee
Verification of compliance with Steer-
ing Committee conditions, endorse-
ment of covenant, notification of
financing decision
Implementation, reporting
Payments

12
13
14 Monitoring
15

Approval of compliance with final
guaranteed result
Approval of final invoice and payment

16

(1) Work shared between Phare Unit and Twinning Team

Abbreviations
CC: Candidate country
MS: Member State
CFCU: Central financing and contracting unit of CC
HQ: Headquarters

Source: European Commission.

HQ
geographical
team

X

HQ line DG

X

X

Opinion

For info

For info

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The Commission developed a Twinning Manual (1), which
7.
sets out in detail the legal, financial and procedural framework for
twinning projects.

from chapter B7-03 (PHARE pre-accession instrument) together
with infrastructure/investment projects.

PROJECT OVERVIEW AND BUDGETARY SIGNIFICANCE

8.
There is no specific article devoted to twinning in the gen-
eral budget of the European Union. The instrument is financed

The Commission launched the twinning concept in 1998
9.
and the first projects started in the summer of 1999. Up to Febru-
ary 2002, a total of 503 twinning projects were approved by the
Commission with a total budget of 471 million euro (see Table 1),
giving an average budget per project of nearly 1 million euro.

Table 1

Overall budget for twinning projects 1998-2001

Year of selection round

Contracted amount
(Mio EUR)

Number of projects

Average per project
(Mio EUR)

1998

1999

2000

2001

Total

(1) Approved projects up to February 2002
Source: European Commission.

73,2

119,2

146,0

132,7

471,1

103

123

146

131 (1)

503

0,71

0,97

1,00

1,01

0,94

10.
The Commission’s central management unit in Brussels
has all information on the amounts contracted for each twinning
project. As to the actual payments made, the Commission’s cen-
tral management unit had no up to date information at the begin-
ning of the Court’s audit because it intended to wait for the clo-
sure of the first round of twinning projects. During the Court’s
audit the central management unit obtained such information
from the Delegations. The responsibility for making payments for
twinning projects lies with central financing and contracting units
(CFCU), based in the Ministry of Finance, and other implement-
ing agencies in each candidate country.

11.
Table 2 shows the twinning projects by candidate country
and by sector (agriculture, environment, etc.). Poland, Romania
and the Czech Republic have the highest number of twinning
projects. Each project may have more than one Member State
participating, either as project leader or partner (see Table 3).

THE COURT’S AUDIT

12.
The main objective of the audit was to assess whether the
implementation of the twinning instrument by the Commission,
the Member States and the candidate countries had been efficient
and effective. The audit did not include an assessment of the legal-
ity and regularity of the commitments and payments. To support
the Court’s assessment of effectiveness of management, a sample
of 45 projects out of all those completed up to February 2002
which numbered 98, covering a variety of sectors of the acquis
communautaire, was examined to establish how far they had met
their objectives as defined in the covenants. Most of these com-
pleted projects were initiated in 1998 which was the start-up year
for the twinning instrument. Special attention was paid to the
area of ‘Structural Fund preparation’, as this will have particular
impact on the future spending of EU funds. A separate audit on
environmental measures funded through the pre-accession instru-
ments (2) included an examination of twinning projects in this

(1) The latest version is dated February 2002.

(2) Special Report No 5/2003 on PHARE and ISPA environmental pro-

grammes (see page 1 of this Official Journal).

Table 2

Twinning projects per sector in the CCs 1998-2001

Sector

Bulgaria

Czech
Republic

Cyprus

Estonia

Hungary

Latvia

Lithuania

Malta

Poland

Romania

Slovakia

Slovenia

Total

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Agriculture and fisheries

Environment

Structural funds

Social policy

Public finance and internal
market (other than 8)

Justice and home affairs

Public administration

Transport, energy and
telecom

9.

Others

9

11

4

2

12

9

0

1

1

6

6

3

11

12

16

1

3

3

Total

49

61

Source: European Commission.

0

0

0

0

1

0

0

0

0

1

6

3

2

4

6

7

0

0

0

7

9

4

5

12

8

0

3

0

4

3

3

1

6

4

0

1

2

5

2

2

5

9

8

1

6

1

28

48

24

39

1

0

1

1

0

1

0

0

0

4

24

9

14

6

28

12

3

5

3

10

4

13

6

16

12

1

2

2

7

6

2

6

9

13

1

4

1

8

1

2

3

7

7

0

1

1

104

66

49

30

87

54

50

50

118

97

7

26

14

503

C
1
6
7
/
2
6

E
N

O

f
f
i
c
i
a
l

J
o
u
r
n
a
l

o
f

t
h
e

E
u
r
o
p
e
a
n
U
n
o
n

i

Number of twinning projects in which the Member States are involved (as leaders or partners)

Table 3

Austria

Belgium

Germany

Denmark

Spain

Finland

France

Greece

Ireland

Italy

Netherlands

Portugal

Sweden

1998
1999
2000
2001

Total

19
14
8
9

50

0
2
1
1

4

57
38
41
31

167

9
12
8
13

42

9
16
33
14

72

14
7
9
8

38

40
33
33
22

7
9
3
6

128

25

5
3
4
5

17

6
13
12
7

38

11
19
14
17

61

0
2
0
0

2

9
27
16
14

66

United
Kingdom

23
27
30
24

104

Total

209
222
212
171

814

Source: European Commission.

.

.

1
7
7
2
0
0
3

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area, and the main findings are incorporated into this
report.

of the final results of projects was concentrated on those which
the Commission indicated were completed by February 2002 (see
paragraph 12).

13.
To assess the efficiency of the implementation of the
instrument the procedures and structures were analysed, espe-
cially for projects which started in the second half of 2001 and at
the beginning of 2002. The assessment included the Commis-
sion’s readiness to learn lessons and take corrective action.

Concept of ‘guaranteed’ results

14.
The audit work included a review of central Commission
management files, project files from selection rounds held in
1998,1999 and 2000 and external monitoring reports by the
OMAS Consortium (1). The auditors attended a PAA meeting in
Brussels in February 2002. They also interviewed the representa-
tives of all stakeholder groups (Delegation, PAAs, project leaders,
national contact points (NCP) (2) and CFCUs) in Estonia, Hungary
and Poland. The NCP in Finland (particularly involved in projects
in the Baltic States) and twinning partners in the United Kingdom
(playing a leading role in the area of external audit) were also vis-
ited. The environmental measures audit included visits to all 10
candidate countries benefiting from PHARE and ISPA assistance.

15.
The Court evaluated the replies to questionnaires received
from the NCPs of eight Member States and six candidate countries
and 54 separate replies to questionnaires received from PAAs and
project leaders during the Court’s visits to Estonia, Hungary and
Poland. Further information was obtained from SIGMA (3). The
Court also took note of the status reports issued by the Commis-
sion in February 2002.

ACHIEVEMENT OF RESULTS

16.
The majority of the twinning projects from the first selec-
tion round 1998 started in the second half of 1999. About a
quarter of them started in the beginning of 2000. As the average
project duration is around 18 months, most of the first round of
twinning projects were completed in the second half of 2001 or
the beginning of 2002. Thus it was necessary for the Commis-
sion to extend the disbursement deadline for some PHARE 1998
twinning projects until 31 March 2002. The Court’s assessment

(1) The OMAS Consortium was charged by the Commission to assess the

work in progress of the EU PHARE programmes.

(2) Each candidate country and Member State has a NCP for institution-

building activities.

(3) SIGMA (Support for Improvement in Governance and Management
in Central and Eastern European Countries) is a joint initiative of the
OECD and the EU and is principally financed by the EU’s PHARE
programme.

17.
The fundamental basis of twinning projects is that they
must result in specific and ‘guaranteed’ progress in candidate
country’s institutional and administrative capacities to adopt, to
implement and to enforce the acquis communautaire. Candidate
countries must establish a modern, efficient administration and
institutions that are capable of applying the acquis to the same
standards as present Member States. According to the Twinning
Manual, candidate country organisations must be fully function-
ing, efficient and sustainable after twinning, although no criteria
were set as to what constitutes a strong administrative capacity.

In order to emphasise this objective of a real, operational
18.
and sustainable outcome in a particular field, the Commission
established the term ‘guaranteed’ results. The design of a twinning
project should be such that results are ensured or ‘guaranteed’.
However, in reality the Commission has no specific means to
ensure that the ‘guaranteed’ results are actually delivered. There is
only the possibility of withholding 10 % of the budget until the
final project report is approved by the Delegation. Even this pro-
vision has not been very effective, as projects’ budgets were cal-
culated rather generously, meaning that budget execution rates
were under 90 % in many cases. Hence there are no significant
financial consequences in the case of only partial success or fail-
ure to reach the ‘guaranteed’ results. In practice, the approval of
the final report is not dependent on success or failure of the out-
come.

Limited achievement of ambitious objectives

19.
In general, the twinning projects acted as catalyst in set-
ting the candidate countries’ reform in motion, bringing together
specialists from Member States and candidate countries’ admin-
istrations. Most progress was made in the adoption of the acquis
communautaire through legislation. However, progress was rather
less regarding its implementation and enforcement. The Court’s
analysis of 45 completed projects showed that it was often pos-
sible to achieve the objectives stated in the covenants only par-
tially within the project period, which made extension or follow-up
projects necessary. It was generally too optimistic to expect that
a fully functioning, efficient and sustainable Candidate Country
organisation would exist in a given field after one twinning
project. Nevertheless, such unrealistic objectives were often stated

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in the twinning covenants. The findings in some major areas were
that:

— in the area of ‘Preparation for Structural Funds’ important
parts of the stated objectives concerning the sound manage-
ment of the Structural Funds and the Cohesion Fund in time
for accession to the European Union could not be achieved
(see details in the Annex),

— in the Environment sector performance has often been below
expectations. Sectoral implementation plans could not be
established as planned and ‘guaranteed’ in the twinning cov-
enants,

— other areas, such as Agriculture and Fisheries or Justice and
Home Affairs, provide examples of projects which were
over-ambitious in conception, and/or did not achieve the
stated objectives.

Concern for sustainability

20.
Many projects included large scale training of staff in can-
didate country administrations. However, PAAs and project lead-
ers pointed out that many of the younger staff in particular would
not stay in public service after training but move to the private
sector. Despite recent improvements, employment in the civil ser-
vice in the candidate countries remains relatively unattractive
because of uncompetitive salaries and poor management (1). Even
if the twinning projects did deliver the ‘guaranteed’ results in such
cases (i.e. the training of a defined number of staff), the long-term
impact on the strengthening of the administrative capacity may
not be achieved because of this high rate of turnover of staff.

21.
The impact of twinning is reduced if adequate attention
is not paid to improving the general framework for public admin-
istration in the candidate countries. The capacity of the civil ser-
vice in most candidate countries is not yet developed to a level
where twinning can be fully effective. The Commission itself
pointed out in its PHARE 2000 Review that the instruments used
in the PHARE programme risk being undermined by systemic
failings in candidate countries national administrations. The OMAS
Consortium concluded in October 2001 that the impact and sus-
tainability of the results of twinning were being reduced because
of the continuing inadequacy of candidate countries’ public admin-
istration culture, systems and funding (2).

Sustainability could also be at risk if Member States with
22.
differences in culture and approach are involved in the same twin-
ning project. For example, the risk was apparent in the start of the
Polish ‘Enhancement of the internal financial control of public
spending’ project. It was hampered by different views on how to
establish adequate internal control systems in the public sector.

Reasons for limited achievements

23.
The ‘guaranteed’ results can only be achieved if all par-
ties perform as required. The audit showed that limited achieve-
ments are in general due to a combination of factors involving all
main parties:

(a) The Member State administrations were not always equipped
to cope with all the extensive requirements of the twinning
rules. Resources required for coordination were underesti-
mated, particularly for consortium projects (two or more
Member States involved). In some cases, the performance of
the PAA did not reach the level required, due to problems
of language and integration. Also delays in recruiting PAA
assistants (3) sometimes had a negative effect on the progress
of twinning projects. The PAA was also not in all cases suf-
ficiently supported by the Member State project leader and
staff changes among the Member State short-term experts
also hindered effective project implementation.

(b) Commitment and ownership by the Candidate Country was
not in all cases sufficiently developed. The candidate coun-
tries sometimes did not sufficiently support the required
reforms and changes. PAAs were not always well equipped
with adequate office facilities and equipment from the begin-
ning of the project. High-level candidate country officials
were in some cases unable to devote sufficient time to project
activities because of their regular work.

(c)

The Commission, which has a final responsibility for twin-
ning, sets the framework but is not directly involved in the
management of twinning projects. The Commission contin-
ues to be in a process of restructuring and trying to optimise
its system for sharing management between its central offices
and its Delegations. Joint efforts were undertaken to advice

(1) See SIGMA publications on fulfilment of civil service baseline in can-

didate countries.

(2) Ad hoc Report on the Twinning Instrument, OMAS Consortium,

24 October 2001.

(3) To facilitate the work of the PAA, a full time assistant (candidate
to deal with translation/

country national) may be provided,
interpretation problem and other project management tasks.

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on individual projects, however, these efforts were some-
times hindered by inefficient exchanges of views and demar-
cation disputes. The Commission did not always respect the
preferences of the candidate country, one of the fundamen-
tal requirements of the twinning rules (partnership prin-
ciple): It heavily promoted twinning even in situations when
the candidate country was convinced that twinning could
not offer the best solution. A further criticism by the candi-
date countries was that the Commission did not always make
sufficient effort to counteract political pressure by Member
States, with the result that the choice of the twinning partner
was not entirely left to the candidate country. There was also
insufficient monitoring of the quality and punctuality of
project reports and unclear information flows to line DGs.
This meant that the Commission was less able to propose
practical and effective recommendations aimed at improv-
ing performance. In addition PAAs criticised the fact that the
Commission did not set up a PAA network.

24.
One overall effect of the situation described above is that
efficiency and effectiveness are reduced (see paragraphs 33 to 44).
However, twinning is a relatively new initiative, and all parties
involved are in the process of learning from experience.

EXTERNAL EVALUATION IN 2000

25.
One positive feature is that the Commission assumed its
responsibility for organising this learning process by ordering an
external evaluation (1) of the twinning instrument at the begin-
ning of 2000, even if at that time none of the projects had been
completed and most had been operational for less than 12 months.

26.
A team of four independent experts from different Mem-
ber State administrations established a ‘report on an assessment
of the twinning instrument under PHARE’ in July 2000. On the
evidence from an examination of 18 twinning projects and the
consultation of all the main stakeholder groups, the experts con-
cluded that improvements could be made in three main aspects:

(a) measures to make twinning more user-friendly: delays in
payments and in decision-making were criticised as well as
the lengthy and complicated covenanting process, which
was found to be bureaucratic, inflexible, cumbersome and
too detailed;

(b) measures to make it easier for Member State administrations

to participate in twinning activities;

(c) measures to help increase the commitment of the candidate

country administrations to twinning.

CORRECTIVE ACTION BY THE COMMISSION AS A RESULT
OF THE EXTERNAL EVALUATION

27.
The Court recognises that the Commission has intro-
duced many improvements as a result of the external evaluation.
The corrective actions undertaken are reflected in several signifi-
cant revisions of the Twinning Manual, the last two of which
became effective in June 2001 and in February 2002 (see para-
graph 43).

28.
In order to improve the drafting of covenants (see
paragraph 26(a)), the external evaluation recommended that the
costs of preparing the covenant should be funded by the PHARE
programme. The revision of June 2001 permitted this possibility
and also introduced greater flexibility, notably concerning the
budgetary rules as well as the introduction of ‘twinning light’ pro-
cedures (2).

The latest revision of February 2002 foresees further

29.
user-friendly measures:

(a)

new PAAs are invited by the Commission to attend a two-
day training seminar at Commission Headquarters in Brus-
sels, the costs for which can be charged to the twinning bud-
get;

(b)

the Member State body responsible for the implementation
of the project may request a higher advance payment than
was previously allowed.

30.
With regard to the Member State administrations’ inter-
est in participating in twinning (see paragraph 26(b)), the Com-
mission also allowed more and more private bodies, which act in
lieu of public administrations, to be mandated to implement
twinning projects. This wider definition takes into account the
general trend in some Member States towards the privatisation of
public activities (but see paragraphs 46 to 48) and has increased
the interest of these Member States in participating in twinning.

(1) Report on an assessment of the twinning instrument under PHARE,

July 2000, European Commission.

(2)

‘Twinning light’ was introduced in June 2001 for projects of limited
scope. The financial ceiling for ‘twinning light’ projects has been set
at 150 000 euro and their duration limited to six months; in excep-
tional cases this can be extended to eight months.

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In respect of the commitment of candidate country admin-
31.
istrations (see paragraph 26(c)), the Commission took measures
to ensure that Candidate Country staff input is presented in detail
in the twinning covenant. The revision of the Twinning Manual
in June 2001 introduced the obligation to ask for prior approval
from both the Commission and the CFCU if a change in candidate
country project leader or PAA counterpart is intended.

cation of the twinning covenant and, finally, starting the PAA’s
work in the candidate country). As a result, some elements in the
project design are often already outdated by the time the project
is able to start so that changes to the covenant become necessary
from the very beginning. The real risk of the withdrawal of the
designated PAA and other key personnel before the start of the
project is a further serious consequence of the lengthy proce-
dures.

32.
In summary, many start-up or teething problems have
been identified and addressed by the Commission. However,
major problems of a more structural nature still persist, which are
described in the following paragraphs.

CONTINUING STRUCTURAL PROBLEMS

Administrative complexity

33.
Many new PAAs who started work in 2001 were still
expressing frustration with the extent of the bureaucracy in all
stages, from project programming to project implementation. In
their opinion too much of their time was spent on purely admin-
istrative issues to the detriment of the main task, namely advising
candidate countries on institution-building. Indeed, the interac-
tion of the numerous public administrations involved in twinning
(the Commission in Brussels, Commission Delegations, various
public bodies in Member States and candidate countries) each
with its own administrative culture creates administrative com-
plexity that diminishes efficiency and effectiveness. The continu-
ing overly long periods between needs assessment and project
realisation (see paragraphs 34 to 36), as well as the highly com-
plicated payment systems (see paragraphs 37 to 44), are two
examples of such difficulties.

35.
Many PAAs criticised the excessive precision required in
the planning process. They considered a waste of resources and
time the need to specify exactly, many months in advance, such
matters as the location of a training event, the number of persons
attending, room hire, travel costs, per diem allowances or the
number of pages to be translated for handouts. In the event of any
deviation from the plan, time-consuming procedures have to be
followed to amend the covenant. If the change concerns a manda-
tory clause (e.g. an article on ‘guaranteed’ results) it takes the form
of an addendum to the covenant (1), which requires formal
approval from headquarters. Side letters have to be drawn up for
changes to indicative clauses of the covenant. In the past many
addenda or side letters were often made during the lifetime of a
project.

36.
In Poland the precise planning of all cost elements for
twinning projects were made redundant in July 2001 by a 60 %
increase in the per diem rates for Member State experts (from 229
euro to 367 euro). This high increase of per diem rates within the
lifetime of twinning projects led to serious disruptions in their
budgetary management. The Polish National Fund was of the
opinion that the increase was not justified and not in line with the
economic reality.

Complicated payment systems

Inefficient procedures from needs assessment up to project
realisation

Before the PAA can start his work in a candidate country,
34.
a project needs to pass through many different stages (see Dia-
gram 1). This results in long periods between the initial needs
assessment and the subsequent practical action to meet those
needs. 30 % of all projects in the 2000 selection round had not
yet been started in February 2002. It took two years in these cases
to complete the various phases (needs identification, successive
drafting of the project outline, call for proposals, selection of
twinning partners, drafting of the twinning covenant, approval of
financing by the Commission’s Steering Committee, signature of
the twinning covenant, endorsement by the Commission, notifi-

37.
Originally, payments for twinning to reimburse Member
States’ costs were made directly by the Commission to Member
States. Responsibility for payments was then transferred to the
candidate countries within the Commissions’ general policy of
decentralisation (increased responsibility for candidate countries).
Thus the main money flow is now from Brussels to the candidate
countries and then from the candidate countries to the Member
States. The PAA’s allowances and expenses are paid directly to
them by the CFCU in the Candidate Country, which is the paying
agent for the EU contribution to twinning projects.

(1) The Delegation is entitled to agree or refuse endorsement of addenda
on behalf of the Commission. It must request formal approval from
headquarters before agreeing addenda concerning a change e.g. of the
‘guaranteed’ results. If the Commission agrees, the Delegation also has
to request the written approval of the CFCU.

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Member State administrations still complain that the
38.
reimbursement of their costs often takes months due to failures
in the payment systems. PAAs also experienced considerable
delays in receiving payments. In some cases advances were not
received in time so they had to use their own funds at the start of
projects to pay for flights, accommodation costs or for their assis-
tant.

eral times in order to improve the instrument. However, this also
increased complexity, as different sets of rules had to be applied
for old and new projects. Further confusion was created because
some changes (clarifications) also applied retroactively (1), whereas
others did not. Coherent advice was not always given by the
Commission, with the result that the twinning financial rules were
not always applied in a consistent way (2).

39.
The overall system has not functioned properly because
of the overly complex interrelated procedures. The coexistence of
the twinning financial rules with other financial or budgetary
rules at the different levels of the Commission, Member States and
candidate countries causes major dysfunctions.

44.
In general, complicated administrative procedures for
twinning take up a disproportionate amount of resources of the
Delegations, the CFCUs and the PAA’s.

40.
PHARE funds in Hungary are administered through the
central budget. The payment procedure at the Hungarian treasury
foresees 27 steps, which resulted in considerable delays in PHARE
payments being made, including twinning payments. The Delega-
tion in this country set up a task force in 2001 to tackle these
payment problems.

41.
The CFCUs have to check whether cost statements sub-
mitted by the Member State twinning partners are accurate and
conform to the twinning rules. The Polish CFCU in particular was
reproached by Member State twinning partners for carrying out
this control in an excessively strict way, thereby causing payment
delays. The Polish CFCU retorted that their checks showed that
many cost statements were inaccurate. Different interpretations of
the twinning rules were one cause of the problems. The Court
found evidence of shortcomings on both sides.

42.
Preparatory work performed in the Member States is not
compensated on the basis of real costs. Instead a flat rate com-
pensation is given, calculated on the basis of the work performed
in the candidate country. Irrespective of the nature of the project
or of the amount of preparation necessary, this flat rate is always
150 % of the fees paid for the work of short-term experts in the
candidate country. Although it is proper that Member States
should be compensated for essential preparatory work carried out
by experts in the Member State, the Commission has not reviewed
the justification of the 150 % rate since its introduction in 2000.
The external evaluation points out that the flat rate compensa-
tion system creates perverse incentives. Since it is mainly up to
the project management in the Member State to assess how much
time is to be spent in the candidate country, it encourages the
experts to do preparatory work in the candidate country instead
of in the Member State.

43.
The application of the twinning financial rules presents a
challenge for the administrative capacities in both Member States
and candidate countries. The Commission changed the rules sev-

Over-emphasis on twinning

45.
Institution-building is not equivalent to twinning. How-
ever, some representatives of the candidate countries criticised the
Commission’s tendency to over-emphasise twinning at the expense
of other mechanisms directed towards institution-building that
are eligible for support (general horizontal support to public ser-
vice (3) (see paragraph 21), private sector service contracts, par-
ticipation in Community programmes). The strong emphasis put
on twinning by the Commission sometimes resulted in a depar-
ture from its original aim and in an insufficiently selective use of
it.

Extended use of twinning for mandated bodies

46.
Twinning is meant to represent cooperation between
public administrations. The PAA should have a specific knowl-
edge of implementing the acquis communautaire in the public sec-
tor administration of a Member State which is not available in the
private sector. According to the Commission, twinning should
offer something that no other tool can, namely help in those areas
that are the exclusive preserve of Government. Twinning should

(1) With each change the Commission indicated that ‘clarifications of
implementation rules may apply to earlier covenants, where appro-
priate, or be subject to prior agreement with the CFCU’.

(2) E.g. the revision of the Manual in June 2001 introduced maximum
rates for Member State Project Leaders and short/medium term experts.
According to a Member State administration these maximum rates
would sometimes be respected and sometimes not in projects from
the 2000 selection round, depending on the advice given by different
Delegations.

(3) Horizontal support to public service is given by SIGMA and TAIEX
(Technical Assistance Information Exchange Office). TAIEX is a Com-
mission office and part of DG ELARG.

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be used in cases where no alternative solution by using private
consultants exists. That is the reason why a derogation from stan-
dard PHARE tendering procedures is made for twinning, allow-
ing the candidate country to make its choice of Member State
twinning partners irrespective of cost.

Twinning cannot stand on its own. In some cases there
51.
was a lack of complementarity and synchronisation with private
sector input. Twinning could not progress because linked tender-
ing, procurement and contracting procedures for equipment were
uncoordinated or delayed. Two examples illustrate the uncoordi-
nated deployment of different means for institution-building:

However, more and more Member State twinning part-
47.
ners are so-called mandated bodies which are defined as bodies
entitled to act in lieu of public administrations. The list of man-
dated bodies accepted by the Commission has grown consider-
ably to more than 300. In this way the Commission has recogn-
ised the Member States’ tendency to entrust public services to
private bodies. There was no formal decision by the Commission
to accept or refuse an organisation as mandated body.

48.
These mandated bodies are often privately owned and
they may also have a commercial interest, leading them to offer-
ing their services via commercial calls for tenders on other occa-
sions (including to the Commission in the framework of its tech-
nical assistance). The status of a mandated body allows it to charge
over 100 % more than the standard fees for experts from public
administrations. However, for twinning they are not required to
submit to competitive tendering procedures. In these cases the
original idea of twinning is lost and it is questionable whether the
derogation from the standard PHARE procedures is appropriate.

Automatic use of twinning

49.
The Court found the use of twinning to often be a default
choice rather than the result of a detailed evaluation between dif-
ferent instruments. Enough consideration was not always given to
whether the conditions for a successful implementation of twin-
ning had been fulfilled. Experience shows that twinning activities
are not well suited to projects where the candidate country has
not yet decided which ministries should have responsibilities for
the activities or where the candidate country has not yet adopted
the necessary legislation. Sometimes twinning was chosen even if
there was no obvious need for an uninterrupted PAA residence of
at least 12 consecutive months (a basic requirement of the twin-
ning instrument).

50.
There were also cases where, after a lot of preparatory
work, the selected twinning projects failed to start and were can-
celled. The Commission then resorted to the use of private con-
tractors. This shows that twinning and private consultancy were
in practice sometimes interchangeable. Not enough thought had
been given in each case, to whether the expertise required could
best be provided by twinning or by private operators.

(a)

(b)

in the Polish ‘Internal financial control at regional level’
project (project duration: October 2001 to October 2003)
the corresponding tender for a database was delayed. The
database was to cover EU structural interventions, with par-
ticular emphasis on the development of a system for moni-
toring community support at regional and local level;

the twinning component of the Hungary project in the area
of Structural Fund preparation (see the Annex, paragraph 4)
was not coordinated with the private consultancy compo-
nent thus increasing the risk of overlaps and the unneces-
sary duplication of efforts.

52.
In general it may be argued that twinning is not neces-
sarily more cost-effective than technical assistance contracts fol-
lowing tendering procedures. The following factors hamper the
achievement of optimum cost-effectiveness of twinning:

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

although Member States and candidate countries are the
contracting parties, the funds are provided by the Commis-
sion. Therefore Member States or candidate countries have
no financial incentive to end the contract if one of the par-
ties does not fulfil its obligations. In some cases poorly per-
forming contracts have been continued with in order to
avoid political problems and final payments have been made
despite results not being achieved;

due to the number of functions and participants involved in
a project, accountability for shortcomings is diffuse (see
paragraphs 23 and 24), which increases the risk of failure or
underperformance;

twinning projects involve many administrations at different
levels, which means that resources are devoted to bureau-
cratic matters to the detriment of the main task, namely
advising candidate countries on institution-building (see
paragraphs 33 to 44);

an uninterrupted PAA residence of 12 months is not neces-
sary or desirable for every project (see paragraph 49). Quick,
flexible and tailor-made solutions to specific problems are
very difficult to fit into the twinning framework. However
the ‘twinning light’ procedures have introduced more flex-
ibility (see paragraph 28).

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TWINNING AND NEW ACTION PLANS 2002

53.
The Commission announced in its 2001 Strategy Paper
on Enlargement that it would reinforce the institution-building
actions in 2002 by an Action Plan for each of the 10 candidate
countries of central and eastern Europe. In June 2002 the Com-
mission reported (1) that these Action Plans were complete and
implementation was underway. A 250 million euro supplemen-
tary institution-building facility under the PHARE programme is
provided.

54.
The Action Plans are now considered by the Commission
to be a major instrument and a key tool in helping the candidate
countries to reinforce their administrative and judicial capacities.
Exactly what role twinning should play within this supplementary
assistance is still to be decided.

The 2002 regular reports from the Commission on the
55.
candidate countries’ progress towards accession identified the
needs still remaining in terms of institution-building before acces-
sion. Under the current mechanism new twinning projects could
not contribute to addressing these needs before 2005. The twin-
ning mechanism is therefore certainly not an instrument for
responding immediately to institution-building needs.

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

A positive initiative

56.
The strengthening of administrative capacity (institution-
building) became a priority of PHARE support in November 1998.
A strong administrative capacity is vital for the candidate coun-
tries of central and eastern Europe, not only because of the spe-
cific needs of EU accession but also for the general transition
towards increased competitiveness in the global economy. Twin-
ning is the main PHARE instrument for strengthening administra-
tive capacity in the context of accession.

sectors is needed for the institution-building process, so twinning
is a laudable initiative by the Commission to assist candidate
countries in acquiring the capacity to adopt, implement and
enforce the acquis.

58.
The Commission has a final responsibility for the twin-
ning programme but it is not directly involved in the twinning
projects and thus has limited possibilities to influence them. The
concept of twinning, although positive overall, implies that the
shared responsibility between the Commission, candidate coun-
tries and Member States hampers a clear and straightforward
accountability structure (see paragraphs 23 and 24).

Limited achievements of ambitious objectives

59.
In general, the twinning projects acted as catalyst in set-
ting the candidate countries’ reform in motion, bringing together
specialists from Member States and candidate countries’ admin-
istrations. Most progress was made in the adoption of the acquis
communautaire through legislation. However, progress was rather
less regarding its implementation and enforcement, The Court’s
analysis of completed projects indicates that the achievements
have in general fallen short of the stated objectives. The so-called
‘guaranteed results’ could often be achieved only partially within
the project period. It was too optimistic to expect that a fully
functioning, efficient and sustainable candidate country organisa-
tion would exist in a given field after one twinning project, the
average duration of which is 18 months. Success was often jeop-
ardised by the multitude of functions and participants in the pro-
cess and a lack of accountability (see paragraphs 19 to 24). The
effect of administrative complexity also hampered the full achieve-
ment of the desired results. Too much time was spent on purely
administrative issues, to the detriment of the main task, namely
advising candidate countries on institution-building (see para-
graphs 33 to 44).

Improving the delivery

Member State administrations and public institutions
57.
have unique knowledge and specific experience concerning the
implementation and enforcement of the acquis communautaire.
Before 1998 the Commission mobilised advice mainly from the
private sector. However, best advice from the private and public

60.
To increase the value for money and to improve the
achievement of results twinning should be more focused on the
timely delivery of results. The capacity to deliver could be strength-
ened in the following ways:

(1) Communication from the Commission on the Action Plans for admin-
istrative and judicial capacity, and the monitoring of commitments
made by the negotiating countries in the accession negotiations,
COM(2002) 256 final of 5.6.2002.

(a)

greater attention should be given to the formulation of a
limited number of realistic and achievable objectives, which
clearly address identified weaknesses in administrative capac-
ity;

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(b)

(c)

(d)

the procedures for assessing the achievement of results should
always be fixed in each covenant, possibly through the use
of performance indicators or benchmarks;

the covenants should also stipulate that the sustainability of
the results must be evaluated after the completion of a
project. The term ‘guaranteed’ is misleading as long as pay-
ments are not tied to the achievement of these targets and it
is recommended that the use of the word ‘guaranteed’ should
be discontinued.

Choosing twinning more selectively

62.
Institution-building is not only twinning. The use of
twinning is too often the default choice when considering
institution-building (see paragraphs 45 to 51). The Commission
should increase its efforts to develop a coordinated and balanced
deployment of different instruments for institution-building (gen-
eral horizontal support to the public service (see paragraph 21),
private sector input, participation in Community programmes).

the Delegations should monitor the achievement of project
benchmarks more promptly, in order to allow timely action
to be taken, such as reorientation of the project or even its
termination.

63.
For cases where mandated bodies are acting as possible
twinning partners, the Commission should establish a procedure
enabling it to pay more attention to the costs involved (see para-
graphs 46 to 48).

Making twinning quicker and less complex

Building on knowledge and experience

61.
Twinning involved lengthy procedures and was too much
occupied with the micro-management of inputs. 30 % of all
projects in the 2000 selection round had not yet been started in
February 2002 (see paragraph 34). The Commission has already
demonstrated its readiness to take corrective action (see para-
graphs 27 to 32). However, further improvements are still neces-
sary to simplify the lengthy procedures at the various stages from
needs assessment up to project finalisation:

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

all stages of project preparation (involving the candidate
countries and Member States as well as the Commission)
should be rationalised without compromising the respect of
sound administrative practice;

the Commission should speed up its own internal consulta-
tion procedures between Headquarters, Delegations and line
DGs by respecting pre-set deadlines;

the Commission should simplify and accelerate the payment
procedures without disregarding the risks involved;

in general, the Commission should consider the use of fixed-
price or lump sum contracts requiring specified deliverables.

64.
Four years of twinning have created a store of specific
knowledge and relationships. PAAs from the first projects are
leaving and new PAAs are arriving. The Commission should cre-
ate a PAA network (perhaps via the Internet) to preserve the store
of specific knowledge, to spread good practice and to reduce the
risk of errors recurring.

Outlook

65.
Twinning will remain relevant far beyond the envisaged
accession. Projects starting just before accession will last for up to
two more years. The normal PHARE support will have to be con-
tinued for candidate countries which are not part of the first wave
of accession. In addition the Commission foresees the funding of
a transition facility for institution-building (available to new Mem-
ber States after accession) covering actions not eligible for the
Structural Funds. Improvements to the instrument will therefore
be worthwhile because twinning is likely to continue for a con-
siderable time.

This report was adopted by the Court of Auditors in Luxembourg at its meeting of 10 April 2003.

For the Court of Auditors

Juan Manuel FABRA VALLÉS

President

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ANNEX

LIMITED ACHIEVEMENT OF AMBITIOUS OBJECTIVES

1.
Twinning brought together specialists from Member States’ and candidate countries’ administrations, creating new
links of technical expertise throughout Europe and initiating first steps to strengthen the administrative capacity in the
candidate countries. Most progress was achieved concerning the alignment of legislation with the acquis communautaire, of
which about 50 % concerns the agriculture sector. In this sector, twinning pushed forward the transposition and adoption
of legislation in subjects such as ‘Integrated administration and control systems’ (IACS), ‘Paying agencies’ and ‘Veterinary
administration’. In other areas too, twinning contributed to the strengthening of the legal and institutional framework, nota-
bly in the fields of ‘Border control and management’, ‘External audit’ and ‘Migration and asylum’.

However, the following examples show that many objectives stated in the twinning covenants were unrealistic and

2.
could only be partially achieved.

Example: Preparation for Structural Funds

3.
The ‘Special preparatory programmes for Structural Funds’ (SPP) in the candidate countries usually include twinning
arrangements. For example, the 1998 PHARE National Programme for Estonia allocated an amount of 3 million euro to the
SPP, of which 21 % was for a twinning project and the remaining 79 % for non-twinning measures. Both the non-twinning
and twinning measures were intended to contribute to the general objective of the SPP, namely the development and imple-
mentation of the necessary structures within the Estonian administration for the sound management of the Structural Funds
and the Cohesion Fund in time for accession to the European Union.

4.
The main PAA concluded that the objectives set for the twinning project were unrealistic and that the benchmarks
were insufficiently precise. Indeed the covenant describes in 30 pages a confused list of around 70 often imprecise objec-
tives, goals, contents, tasks, expected results, specific purposes, benchmarks and activities. This makes the subsequent evalu-
ation of results extremely difficult. As a consequence, the final report of the twinning project did not systematically compare
the results with the set of objectives and outputs described in the covenant and nor did it distinguish between those results
due to twinning and those due to technical assistance.

5.
The Hungarian SPP twinning project (2,6 million euro) was also very ambitious in content and time allocation. Out
of the 40 objectives or results in the four finalised components, only 15 were described as fully completed by the Delega-
tion. Achievement was especially weak in the ‘European Social Fund’ and ‘Sapard’ (1) components. The purpose of the Sapard
component was to enable the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) to administer the Sapard pre-
accession measure. At the end of the project (January 2001 for the Sapard component), the Sapard Agency had not yet been
provisionally accredited and a large amount of work was still required before this could be achieved. This was due primarily
to the decision to move the Agency from the Agricultural Intervention Centre to the MARD mid-way through the project.
As such only half of the stated objectives were achieved in the Sapard component.

6.
The SPP project in Poland (6,75 million euro for phases one and two) was not only very ambitious but also extremely
complex (eight PAAs, six Member States, 16 actions covered by three components). Some of the project objectives, mainly
in the second component comprising the establishment of a legal and administrative basis for Structural Funds/Cohesion
Fund including ISPA and Sapard, were not achieved. This was in part because of this complexity. In particular the procedures,
administrative capacities and the role of organisations at regional level were not clarified.

7.

Irregularities committed in the Agency for Restructuring and Modernisation of Agriculture (ARMA) had a strongly

(1)

Special action programme for agriculture and rural development, the pre-accession instrument for this sector.

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adverse effect on the achievement of the objectives in all two agricultural-related twinning projects (1). An external audit
(October 2001) as well as investigations by OLAF and by the Polish Supreme Chamber of Audit (February 2002) reported
major incidents of mismanagement in ARMA: EU-funded equipment and staff trained under the twinning project were
transferred from the public administration to a private company. The Commission issued a recovery order of 2,8 million
euro in February 2002. Because the PAAs only operated at a relatively low level within ARMA, they were not aware of this
transfer to a private company.

8.
In the SPP project in Lithuania some benchmarks were deleted, namely those related to the testing of the established
administrative systems and procedures. It became clear during the implementation period that all the necessary structures
to implement the pre-accession funds could not be in place before the end of the project.

9.
The ‘guaranteed’ results could to a large extent not be achieved for the SPP/1 projects in Bulgaria (according to the
Commission, due to a lack of commitment on the part of the beneficiary, an inexperienced PAA and inadequate back-up
from home administration) and in Latvia (very poor working relations between partners and weak project management).

(1)

PL98/IB/AG-01 (Introduction of integrated administration and control system) and PL98/IB/AG-03 (Animal identification and registra-
tion system).

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THE COMMISSION’S REPLIES

SUMMARY

The Commission takes note of the Court’s positive and
I-II.
constructive appraisal of twinning as a positive initiative for
institution-building. Twinning was created as a new instrument
for targeted international/European administrative cooperation.
Prior to its launch, assistance in ublic administrative reform in the
candidate countries was delivered through consultancy contracts,
which neither drew on practical ‘hands-on’ experience nor resulted
in effective transfer of practical expertise. Very often, these con-
tracts merely yielded theoretical reports, devoid of practical rel-
evance. Twinning thus grew as from 1998 as an experiment. All
this underscores the need to analyse twinning (and more espe-
cially its key aspects: targeted programming and implementation
through public sector experts) in relation to the alternative of tra-
ditional technical assistance.

III.
The concept of ‘guaranteed results’ was the key feature of
twinning. Both project partners commit themselves to work
towards a commonly agreed result in a joint project implementa-
tion process. The Commission indicated from the outset that
twinning projects should focus on limited and well-defined insti-
tutional targets. This realistic approach, however, conflicted at
times with the high level of ambition of the beneficiary countries.
It is not, therefore, disputed that the earlier projects in particular
were over-ambitious, and at times failed to achieve their targets.
However, even these ambitious projects acted as a catalyst in set-
ting the reform process in motion, and compared to the results
achieved by the technical assistance-based approach from 1990-
1996, twinning has a good track record.

Finally, the positive feedback from administrations involvedin
twinning was essential in building Member State’s confidence and
secured closure of the negotiations in Copenhagen. This widely
acclaimed success was the ultimate guaranteed result delivered by
twinning.

IV.
Two of the most important, non-measurable but visible
results of twinning are network building and change of attitudes
and behaviour. During those four years of implementation, twin-
ning brought together specialists from Member States’ and can-
didate countries’ administrations who were seldom international
experts, creating a network of technical expertise throughout
Europe. This is a fundamental process for building an enlarged
Europe and for bringing Europe closer to its citizens. Most of the
Member State experts and the candidate country civil servants
were involved for the first time in an EU project and had for the
first time the responsibility of managing EU funds. In many of the
cases, the links formed continued after the closing of the respec-
tive project, both between Member States and candidate countries
as well as between different Member State administrations.

In 1998 there was insufficient knowledge about the spe-
V.
cific rules and principles in twinning with any of the actors
involved (be it EC Delegations, Member States or Candidate Coun-
tries). Subsequently twinning project design and implementation
evolved through a process of ‘learning by doing’. The Twinning
Manual embodies the evolution of a practice, which is now well
settled. The aim of all amendments to the Twinning Manual has
indeed been to maintain twinning as a pragmatic instrument and
to simplify procedures as much as possible.

VI.
Bringing experts from different countries and administra-
tive cultures, with no previous experience in international coop-
eration, to work together efficiently has been and is a complex
and difficult task. Many of the rules governing twinning projects
have been introduced to ensure proper spending of PHARE funds
allotted to twinning. The Commission has also repeatedly insisted
with the twinning task managers in Delegations and headquarters
to maintain a flexible yet sound approach during the implementa-
tion of the projects. Great efforts have been made to speed up
payments. More selective use of twinning can be addressed at the
programming stage. The Commission refers in this respect to
Annex 3 of the annual Phare Programming Guidelines entirely
devoted to adequate and targeted programming of Twinning and
Twinning light.

VII.
Through twinning the Commission pioneered an unprec-
edented transfer of know-how on complex and technical issues
from the diverse administrative traditions in Member States to the
equally diverse candidate countries. It was also essential in mobil-
ising political will and resources in the candidate countries.

— Rate of delivery: while the recommendation of the Court is
supported, twinning projects are not assimilated to supply
or investment agreements. Meeting the twinning objectives
is often dependent upon external, political factors.

— Time frame of stages in the project: the Twinning Manual
now provides for a general deadline of six months between
selection ands start of the project. All other procedural dead-
lines, including those set for twinning steering committee
proceedings do not exceed 10 working days.

— The Commission has already taken steps to ensure simplifi-
cation of payment procedures by increasing the amount of
advance payments

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— The recommendation to use fixed-price or lump sum con-
tracts requiring specified deliverables would not be practical
in all situations since the financing of Twinning projects is
based on recovery of expenses incurred by administrations
or mandated bodies.

— The identification and design of institution-building twin-
ning projects is the result of a well balanced process and dia-
logue between the Commission and the candidate country
under the final scrutiny and approval of the PHARE Manage-
ment Committee. Proper programming is of the utmost
importance and this has been duly stressed in the PHARE
Programming guidelines at least since 2000.

— PAA network: the Commission welcomes this suggestion
and is prepared to refine its data base where all the profes-
sional data and contacts of PAAs are already available so that
a network could be set up.

INTRODUCTION

The pre-accession advisers (PAAs) are the ‘core’ of the
4.
twinning projects, but one should also highlight that both project
leaders (one from the Member State and one from the candidate
country) are also key actors for the success of a twinning project.

6.
The Commission designs the twinning instrument, pro-
vides financing, advice and ensures monitoring and evaluation
but the project implementation lies exclusively with the project
partners. This highlights two essential features of twinning (i) its
interlinkage of cooperation between Member State and candidate
country administrations and the (ii) the traditional role of the
Commission as facilitator and coordinator.

The Twinning Manual has been widely recognised as a
7.
very useful record of good twinning practices which provides
steady yet flexible guidelines for effective project management.

ACHIEVEMENT OF RESULTS

The latest revision of the Twinning Manual in February 2002 led
to a swifter covenanting process, which has considerably short-
ened the effective start of twinning projects.

17-22.
More than one twinning project can indeed be required
to reach proper implementation of the Community acquis in a
given field or sector. The ‘guaranteed result’ can therefore easily
be an intermediate benchmark, which constitutes a specific crite-
rion in relation to administrative capacity, as long as there is a
jointly agreed target. This target must be measurable and precise.

The implementation of a twinning project is based on the

18.
recovery of costs incurred.

The amount of funds which can potentially be withheld follow-
ing a refusal of the final report has been increased to 20 % (Febru-
ary 2002 revision of the Twinning Manual). Non-approval of the
final report would in fact only be a penalty for the Member State
involved in the twinning project whereas the implementation of
the project is a joint responsibility, together with the authorities
of the candidate country. The consequences of failure for the Can-
didate Country are more indirect. If a twinning project failed to
set up institutions crucial for the implementation of the Commu-
nity acquis or failed to incorporate parts of the acquis into national
legislation, this was usually reflected in the Regular Reports on
progress made by the candidate country and therefore had con-
sequences in the accession negotiations.

Furthermore, the Twinning Manual contains provisions to reori-
ent the project (especially after the first six months) or to halt a
project before finalisation in case of ineffectiveness or other fail-
ure. This last alternative is something both candidate countries
and Member States endeavour to prevent at all cost because this
could reflect badly on their perceived commitment to the enlarge-
ment process. Indeed, the Commission decided to halt two projects
before their end date (BG99/IB-CO-02 National Health Insurance
Fund and BG99/IB-CO-01 Coordination of social security schemes)

16.
The Commission realises that, especially in the start up
period considered in the sample of projects examined by the
Court, some twinning projects require considerable preparatory
work. Nevertheless, in Poland, for example, eight out of nine
twinning covenants were endorsed before the end of October
1999. The one remaining covenant was endorsed in February
2000.

19.
In particular during the start-up period, the beneficiaries
undertook important commitments in the negotiations, the size
and importance of which were reflected in some very ambitious
and sometimes over-ambitious twinning covenants. Hence it is
not disputed that especially the earlier projects were over-ambitious
in design. Nevertheless, even these ambitious projects acted as a
catalyst in setting the reform process in motion.

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— The programming of Structural Funds projects is in general
a more complex exercise than for other ‘acquis-related’
projects, as it covers ‘practices’ rather than specific Directives
or regulations. Furthermore the design of a Structural Funds
project fiche involves very detailed horizontal consultations.
Once the implementation of a project has been awarded to
a Member State, it is up to the beneficiary and the selected
Member State partner to set-up the proper activities/strategy,
which will enable the achievement of guaranteed results.
Reference is made to the Commission’s detailed response to
the Annex.

— Furthermore, institution-building is a particular challenge in
the environment sector because Ministries of Environment
are relatively new, while regional and local authorities as
well as environmental agencies also require assistance to
meet their responsibilities in relation to the acquis. Coordina-
tion between the Ministry of Environment and these other
institutions and coordination between the Ministry and other
ministries is often very difficult and has to be developed.

20 and 21.
The problem of sustainability is not specific to
twinning; it derives from the general environment of public admin-
istration in the candidate countries with high turn over of person-
nel, low salaries and sometimes poor management. The acute
human resource constraints in public administration can only be
fully overcome through growth and development, underpinned
by the economic security and solidarity provided through mem-
bership. Nonetheless, the Commission does not overlook the gen-
eral environment of public administration, which is targeted
through SIGMA Programme (Support for Governance and Man-
agement in PHARE Candidate Countries).

22.
There is also a very positive side to the involvement of
more than one Member State in a given twinning project as such
involvement presents the Candidate Country with different alter-
natives rather than with just one national model. In fact the dif-
ferent approaches often enrich the project.

In the case of the specific twinning project referred to by the
Court, the Polish beneficiaries were in the end very satisfied that
the Member State partners applied a mixture of Swedish and
French approaches. In order to safeguard an efficient project man-
agement, the Commission has nevertheless introduced limits on
both the numbers of Members States (maximum two Member
States) involved in the same project and on the size of the projects.

23 (a) During the start-up phase, the Member State’ administra-
tions had to learn about this new instrument and to adjust
their own structures so as to provide efficient assistance.
With time, the necessary adjustments have been made
and most Member State administrations have indeed
become very efficient in setting up and managing twin-
ning projects.

According to the latest revision of the Twinning Manual
(February 2002) the assistant can be selected before the
notification of the covenant whereas the service contract
shall be signed with the selected assistant after notifica-
tion. This innovation is one of the attempts to shorten
the duration of administrative procedures.

(b) The commitment and ownership by the candidate coun-
tries improved over time. The required joint signature of
all quarterly reports is one of the requirements to increase
this commitment.

The EC Delegation delayed the implementation of some
projects for some situations, where no visible signs of
adequate commitment on the beneficiary side were mani-
fest.

(c) Re: Role of the Commission

The identification and design of institution-building twin-
ning projects is the result of a well balanced process and
dialogue between the Commission and the candidate
country under the final scrutiny and approval of the
PHARE Management Committee.

The Commission designs the twinning instrument, pro-
vides financing, advice and ensures monitoring and evalu-
ation but the project implementation lies exclusively with
the project partners. (See reply to paragraph 6).

Re: Political pressure in the selection process

Delegations convey the same message: political pressure
in the selection process is experienced from the side of
some Member State administrations. The Commission
has actively discouraged such pressure.

Re: Quality of reports

Delegations frequently write to twinning project leaders
about the quality of the quarterly reports and the timing
of their delivery with recommendations for improve-
ment. The Commission supports this by asking the Del-
egations to add their own short appraisal on each report.

Re: Transparency of selection

In order to avoid lack of transparency during the selec-
tion procedure, the Commission insists that the benefi-
ciaries fill in a standard table showing the advantages and
shortcomings of each of the Member State proposals.
This table is then sent to the unsuccessful Member States

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explaining why they have not been selected. As the ben-
eficiary institutions know in advance that their ‘evalua-
tion table’ will be disclosed to the competing Member
States, their evaluation/justification is therefore meant to
be objective and detailed.

criterion 2 and/or 3 are only partially fulfilled, the mandate is
restricted subject to an exclusion from commercial tenders in the
direct follow-up to the twinning project.

24.

See the replies to paragraphs 33 and 34.

The Commission has consistently applied these criteria with the
necessary transparency and objectivity.

EXTERNAL EVALUATION IN 2000

CONTINUING STRUCTURAL PROBLEMS

The Commission has duly acted upon the recommenda-

26.
tions of this report

(a)

(b)

(c)

In the 2001 and 2002 revisions of the Twinning Manual, the
Commission introduced more substantial advance payments
(Point 7.2 of the Manual), an overall limit on the time needed
for drafting of covenant (Point 3.6 of the Manual), introduc-
tion of audit certificate to limit paperwork (Point 7.3.2 of
the Manual).

Possibility to recover preparatory costs from the twinning
budget (Point 5.2 of the Manual) and clearer financial arrange-
ments for PAA training (Point 5.2.2 of the Manual).

Information sessions on twinning have been organised in
most candidate countries. The Court fully recognises that
corrective measures have been taken as mentioned in the
paragraphs below.

CORRECTIVE ACTION BY THE COMMISSION AS A RESULT
OF THE EXTERNAL EVALUATION

29 (b) A major step taken to make twinning more user-friendly
was indeed the change of the payment procedures in
February 2002 whereby the Member State twinning part-
ner may henceforth request an advance payment propor-
tionate to nine months of project implementation funds
from the CFCU.

The

30.
certain non-
reasoning behind assimilating
administrative bodies to administrations is that some Member
States have or are in the process of out-sourcing and privatising
parts of their administration. The know-how required for twin-
ning projects is therefore sometimes located outside the admin-
istration proper.

Since the very beginning the Commission has set four qualifying
criteria for mandated bodies: 1. proven competence in a field of
the acquis
communautaire, 2. non-profit organisation, non-
commercial business purpose 3. public ownership and 4. under
the supervision of an administrative body. In some cases where

33.
The observations of some PAAs should be counterbal-
anced by the fact that some of them do not have sufficient experi-
ence in project management as such and that they sometimes lack
adequate backup from their home administrations. Most of the
Member State experts and the candidate country civil servants
were involved for the first time in a twinning project and had for
the first time the responsibility of managing EU funds.

Bringing experts from different countries and administrative cul-
tures, with no previous experience in international cooperation,
to work together efficiently is in general a complex and difficult
task. Many of the rules have been introduced to guarantee proper
spending of Community funds.

34.
The latest revision of the Twinning Manual imposes an
overall deadline of six months for the negotiation, submission
and approval of the twinning covenant by the selected project
partners. As a consequence, the covenanting process has been
considerably speeded up during the 2002 twinning exercise.

In comparison with twinning, start-up delays are usually longer
for technical assistance or investment projects. Sometimes, their
cause is external (lack of political will, lack of proper conditions
for starting up the project, bad planning, elections in the candi-
date country, change of staff, etc). The Commission took steps to
avoid delays:

— Poland and Romania for instance decided to build a deadline
in the Financial Memorandum (three months for the part-
ners to come up with an advanced agreed covenant),

— the preparation costs are paid only for a limited amount of

time, and

— EC Delegations got involved in supporting the partners in
the drafting process, organising meetings and providing
detailed comments and guidance.

There has been considerable progress since the 2001 twinning
projects.

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The requirement of a detailed work plan proved to be the
35.
only way to make partners think ahead and define their project
concept and methodology. The absence of such jointly negotiated
work plan would result in uncertainties and possibly disagree-
ments during the project implementation.

From the beginning the Twinning Manual has aimed to
41.
set clear and consistent rules for the concrete implementation of
twinning projects. Efforts to streamline implementation have been
upheld: as an example, the Commission regularly issues short and
practical guidelines under the format of twinning news sent by
e-mail to all Delegations.

The twinning manual provides for a flexible structure to amend
approved covenants. As in all contractual relationships, proposed
amendments have to be notified beforehand. This is a logical
requirement because these amendments very often encompass an
adjustment in the expenditure pattern of Community funds.

36.
In the case of Poland, the increase of the per diem rates has
indeed created general unease. It has therefore been decided that
the per diem rates set for this candidate country would be reduced
from September mid 2002.

38.
Reimbursement of expenses incurred follows the time
pattern of spending itself. This logically explains that reimburse-
ments are spread out over time. The reverse side of slow pay-
ments by CFCUs is sometimes the unsatisfactory presentation of
invoices submitted by the Member State administrations.

The Commission advises PAAs to wait until they receive the
advance before taking up their posts.

39.

The Commission wishes to stress again:

— that many of the rules have been introduced to ensure proper

spending of PHARE funds,

— that the projects examined belong to the very first series of
projects and that the Commission has since then taken cor-
rective measures, as acknowledged by the Court.

Twinning evolved as a totally new instrument of targeted admin-
istrative cooperation to enhance the preparation of enlargement.

40.
The Delegation in Budapest has indeed set up a task force
in 2001 to tackle the payment problems. As a result of the advice
of the task force the Office of the National Authorising Officer in
Hungary prepared guidelines for the ministries and other parties
involved in twinning payment procedures to streamline the nec-
essary steps to be taken for smooth payment execution. Training
and consultation days were organised on the same topic. If fur-
ther problems occur, the task force can be convened at any time.

The allocation of flat rate compensation for experts was
42.
introduced to alleviate administrative burden of checking the costs
of preparatory work conducted in the Member State. The flat rate
compensation is justified in comparison with expense structure of
technical assistance contracts. One should also consider that the
flat rate fee constitutes an element of flexibility, simplifying pro-
cedures. The amount of the flat rate (150 %) was based on a fac-
tual analysis of the proportion of expert fees that were previously
charged for preparatory work in the Member State and of the
average amount charged for overhead costs in relation with expert
work on the project.

The amendments to the manual have always aimed at
43.
improving clarity. The manual specifies to which covenants
amended rules should apply but in order to maintain flexibility
the manual indeed states that ‘clarifications of implementation
rules may apply to earlier covenants, where appropriate or be
subject to prior agreement with CFCU’. The aim of these rules is
precisely to ensure a uniform yet responsive application of the
Twinning rules.

44.
PHARE funds allotted to twinning projects are contracted
without a public tendering process and therefore without a pro-
cess of price determination via a competitive process. A clear set
of administrative rules to fix the prices for public sector services
has thus to be defined and implemented. During the implementa-
tion of the twinning projects it has therefore to be checked
whether the project partners comply with these rules. This some-
times proves cumbersome, as many twinning partners have no or
very limited experience with such financial rules.

Moreover, twinning projects have been and are indeed very impor-
tant in terms of preparing for accession. It therefore makes sense
for the Commission to allocate appropriate resources to manage
these projects.

45.
This could be dealt with at the programming stage. The
identification and design of institution-building twinning projects
is the result of a well balanced process and dialogue between the
Commission and the candidate country under the final scrutiny
and approval of the PHARE Management Committee.

Regarding more precisely the ‘overemphasising of twinning’ one
should recall that in 1998 and 1999 twinning as a new instru-
ment was indeed emphasised to get the process started.

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The Commission underscores that the selection of twin-
46.
ning proposals is also based on a competitive process, which
takes into account the specificities of public administrations.

Twinning should be used where it works better than commercial
expertise, bearing in mind earlier, unsatisfactory experience with
PHARE public administration projects.

The risks of failure of twinning projects are the same as
50.
in any technical assistance assignment or other project. If the
twinning covenant is properly defined, including correct bench-
marks and correct definition of the work plan, with realistic
appraisal of the tasks, the risk of failure is on the contrary in many
cases less than in a technical assistance project. The political fac-
tor has an important role in preventing failure: in most of the
cases, the Member State administration takes pride in having a
successful project. The participation, motivation of the benefi-
ciary can be a positive or a negative factor, but would be the same
in any kind of project.

47.
The involvement of mandated bodies is consistent with
the diverging administrative structures of certain Member States
which tend to source out public service tasks to public or semi-
public bodies on a cost recovery basis (subsidiarity principle).
Moreover, in view of the growing number of twinning projects,
the possibility to call on mandated bodies supplements Member
States’ capacity to present adequate and complete proposals. Some
smaller Member States may experience capacity shortages which
would prevent them from bidding on the growing number of
twinning projects in the absence of mandated bodies.

48.
The Commission has repeatedly insisted with the Mem-
ber States to maintain public sector consistency within the imple-
mentation of twinning projects and has asked not to call on pri-
vate sector experts either through CFCU or through temporary
appointments in mandated bodies to a degree which could jeop-
ardise the overall purpose of twinning, i.e. building structural
links between administrations.

See comments under 45 regarding the programming of

49.
twinning projects.

The updated PHARE programming guidelines for 2001 and later
have softened the requirement regarding the minimum duration
of the stay of the PAA: Until the 2001 programming exercise, the
Commission has insisted that the PAA spend at least 12 consecu-
tive months working in the candidate country. In view of the now
impending accession of the 10 Laeken countries, there may be
cases where the presence of the PAA could be reduced; e.g. per-
manent presence of a PAA at the beginning, for a period of per-
haps four to six months to kick-start the project, followed up by
a monthly repeat visit of up to maybe a week by the same expert
to ensure that the momentum is maintained.

51.
Twinning does not stand on its own. In many cases,
twinning project has an investment component attached, some-
times even a technical assistance project. These are complemen-
tary and such programming shows precisely that each instrument
was dedicated to a specific purpose. A coordination effort is
needed and adequate planning for the contracting to be concluded
at the right time. The delay in contracting showed that in most of
the cases twinning was first to start and that the risk of failure of
tenders (for technical assistance or investment) was higher than
for twinning. Coordination of twinning activities and investment
components as well as help in the evaluation of the technical
quality of offers.

(a)

For Twinning project PL00/IB/FI03 this assistance was clearly
spelled out in the covenant. The fact that there were delays
in the tendering process was not related to twinning and
therefore should not be an argument in the assessment of
the twinning instrument as such. The database mentioned
will cover EU structural interventions only when Poland will
receive such support as a Member State, i.e. not before 1 May
2004. It can even be argued that the delay in the tendering
for the IT software referred to by the Court was in this par-
ticular case beneficial because it allowed the experienced
twinning experts to assist in drafting the ToR for this cru-
cially important tender.

(b) Coordination during the implementation of the project, was

done through the following means:

— formal meetings of the Interministerial coordination or
monitoring committee convened on a quarterly basis
involved both the twinning and non-twinning partners
and the delegation in Budapest,

— the Structural Funds non-twinning team organised
monthly meetings to which the twinning partners were
invited,

— professional meetings organised between the short term
experts and the PAAs — some products were delivered
in cooperation between both teams,

The decision on the duration of the PAA’s stay in the candidate
country must be made at the programming stage and implemen-
tation monitored very strictly by the Commission.

— any problems that occurred were not due to the lack of
coordination during the implementation but mainly to
the design of the programme.

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The basic reason why twinning has been preferred over
52.
technical assistance contract to implement some institution-
building projects is that twinning projects mobilise experts with
more pertinent and hands-on expertise as to the actual implemen-
tation of acquis related issues.

(a)

The Twinning manual contains provisions to reorient the
project (especially after the first six months) or to halt a
project before finalisation in case of ineffectiveness or other
failure. This last alternative is something both candidate
countries and Member States endeavour to prevent at all
cost because this could reflect badly on their perceived com-
mitment to the enlargement process. Indeed, the Commis-
sion decided to halt two projects before end date (BG99/IB-
CO-02 National Health Insurance Fund and BG99/IB-CO-01
Coordination of social security schemes)

(b) The failure or shortcomings of twinning projects had and
have almost direct consequences on progress in the acces-
sion negotiations with the candidate countries involved.
Moreover, the risk failure by Member States involved in a
given twinning project would jeopardise their standing and
chances of being selected for subsequent twinning projects.

(c) Any project supposes management and the existence of a set
of rules that may cause a degree of complexity. Twinning
gets many administrations to work together even if these
administrations have their own rules. This may seem diffi-
cult in the beginning, but proved feasible and manageable in
the last two years, especially for those cases where adequate
support was mobilised by the Member States.

(d)

See Annex 3 to PHARE programming guidelines (instruc-
tions for design of institution-building projects based on
input from Member State public administrations — twin-
ning and twinning light) which indeed allow the necessary
flexibility as to the length of the PAA’s secondment since
2002.

TWINNING AND NEW ACTION PLANS 2002

CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

57.
The Commission takes note of the Court’s positive and
constructive appraisal of twinning as a laudable initiative for
institution-building. Through twinning the Commission indeed
pioneered an unprecedented transfer of know-how on complex
and technical issues from the diverse administrative traditions in
Member States to the equally diverse candidate countries. The
Commission again highlights the specific genesis of twinning as
new and unique instrument for targeted international/European
administrative cooperation.

58.
The concept of twinning although positive overall, implies
however the cooperation and commitment of many administra-
tive partners, which may in turn explain administrative complex-
ity, especially in the start period under review in the present report.

Candidate countries have indeed made quicker progress
59.
in the adoption of the acquis communautaire through legislation
than through administrative implementation and enforcement. It
is debatable to conclude that the overall performance of twinning
is below expectation, in view especially of the conclusions of
Directorate-General Enlargement’s internal assessment of the 1998
and 1999 twinning projects. Twinning was never considered the
sole, ultimate and general solution to all needs of the administra-
tive capacity in the candidate countries. It will produce its (lim-
ited) effects to the extent it is correctly used and in the context of
the general support to the candidate countries. The Commission
underscores that the concept of ‘guaranteed result’ was the key
feature of twinning from the very beginning. In twinning, both
project partners commit themselves to work towards a commonly
agreed result in a joint project implementation process, possibly
with the definition of intermediary benchmarks. It is precisely this
joint and previously agreed commitment which distinguishes
PHARE twinning from other instruments for administrative assis-
tance and institution building. If one considers the results achieved
by Twinning to those obtained in the context of the old technical
assistance based approach during the years 1990 to 1996, then
twinning has a good track record.

The supplementary assistance provided under the action
institution-building

54.
plans may be used to finance additional
actions, including, where appropriate, twinning projects.

Twinning is by definition based on the cooperation between
administrative partners from the Member States, the candidate
countries and the Commission which entails an inevitable ele-
ment of administrative complexity

As already indicated, the Commission has taken numer-
55.
ous steps to shorten procedures with (i) deadlines for the drafting
of the twinning covenant, (ii) the introduction of twinning light
and the unallocated institution-building budget which can be used
for needs that have suddenly arisen for short and long term mea-
sures.

The existing procedural rules have been introduced to guarantee
proper spending of PHARE funds; whenever necessary, the rules
have been adjusted.

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60 (a) This is dealt with at the programming stage. The identi-
fication and design of Institution building Twinning
projects is the result of a well balanced process and dia-
logue between the Commission and the candidate coun-
try under the final scrutiny and approval of the PHARE
Management Committee.

(b) Twinning project partners are required to report regu-
larly and in depth and that the implementation of twin-
ning projects is monitored on an on-going basis.

(c) The problem of sustainability is not specific to twinning;
it derives from the general environment of public admin-
istration in the candidate countries with high turn over
of personnel, low salaries and sometimes-poor manage-
ment. For reasons explained above, the concept of guar-
anteed result implies the need for the administrative part-
ners to achieve clear and verifiable results. In this sense
this commitment is central to twinning and cannot be
dropped without jeopardising its essential characteristics.

to provide their comments within 10 working days after
which the steering committee normally finalises its decision
within two or three working days. For amendments requir-
ing the approval of the twinning steering Committee, the
deadlines for consultation are even shorter — five working
days. Moreover the Twinning Manual provides for a general
deadline of six months between selection ands start of the
project.

(c) As explained, the Commission has already taken steps to
simplifying payment procedures by increasing the amount
of advance payments.

62.
The identification and design of institution-building twin-
ning projects is the result of a well balanced process and dialogue
between the Commission and the candidate country under the
final scrutiny and approval of the PHARE Management Commit-
tee. Proper and targeted programming is of the utmost impor-
tance and this has been duly highlighted in the PHARE Program-
ming guidelines at least since 2000.

(d) Delegations are already very involved in the monitoring
and steering of twinning projects. The Court seems to
recognise this involvement in its report.

63.
The Commission has provided for a transparent and con-
sistent procedure to remunerate the involvement of mandated
bodies that is based on fixed fees and flat rate compensation.

61.
The Commission welcomes however the Court’s com-
ments as to corrective actions taken on the basis of lessons learnt
from 1998/1999 twinning projects.

64.
The Commission welcomes this suggestion and is pre-
pared to refine its data base where all the professional data and
contacts of PAAs are already available so that a network could be
set up.

(a) The Court has recognised in its observations 27 to 32 that
the Commission has shown readiness to improve procedural
requirements for twinning projects in due course.

(b) The Commission submits that the internal consultation pro-
cedures within the framework of the twinning steering com-
mittee already encompass clearly set deadlines, which are
generally upheld. As such, Directorates-General are requested

It is indeed true that twinning, as a unique instrument for
65.
pre-accession assistance has attracted quite some attention since
it is mentioned in the Commission’s White Paper on European
Governance (Page 25: ‘The Union can effectively draw on the
experience acquired with the applicant countries, such as on the
twinning arrangements’) and even in the latest Report from the
Commission on European Governance of 11 December 2002 (1).

(1) Report from the Commission on European Governance of 11 Decem-
ber 2002; under point 3.2, sixth paragraph: In the white paper on
European Governance, the Commission, drawing on experience
acquired with the applicant countries, announced that it would pro-
pose twinning agreements between national authorities in order to encour-
age the sharing of best practices in implementing measures in par-
ticular sectors and promote awareness of Community law among
national courts and lawyers. The Commission intends to propose
twinning arrangements in 2003 with a view to modifying the ‘Twin-
ning programme’ currently applied during a transitional period.

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ANNEX

LIMITED ACHIEVEMENT OF AMBITIOUS OBJECTIVES

1.
Through twinning the Commission pioneered an unprecedented transfer of know-how on complex and technical
issues from the diverse administrative traditions in Member States to the equally diverse candidate countries. It was also
essential in mobilising political will and resources in the candidate countries.

During the period under review in the Court’s report, twinning projects indeed mainly focused on four key areas (agriculture,
finance, environment and justice and home affairs) whereas subsequently twinning projects covered the whole of the acquis
in the wider sense.

Example: Preparation for Structural Funds

3.
The programming of Structural Funds projects is in general a more complex exercise than for other ‘acquis-related’
projects, as it covers rather ‘practices’ than specific Directives or Regulations. Furthermore the design of a SPP project fiche
involves very detailed horizontal consultations from both sides, beneficiary and Commission Institutions. Once the imple-
mentation of a project has been awarded to a Member State, it is up to the beneficiary and the selected Member State partner
to set-up the proper activities/strategy, which will enable the achievement of guaranteed results.

Regarding the specific Structural Funds projects for Estonia, the Commission accepts that the initial and first Structural Funds
project was not perfectly designed but the final report nevertheless assessed the results obtained and compared them with
the objectives initially set.

The Commission refers to its general comments regarding the inherent complexity of programming the Structural
5.
Funds twinning projects, especially in the start up phase of twinning. Later Structural Funds twinning projects have been
designed on a more compact basis.

The main reason was that it was at that time too early to establish the legal and administrative basis for SFs for two
6.
reasons: 1. candidate countries did not know the date of accession then; 2. the road map for SFs was only presented to the
andidate countries in March 2000.

The Commission learnt from the difficulties of coordinating such projects and introduced limits for both the number of
Member States involved in the same project and for the size of the project.

While acknowledging the deletion of some benchmarks as a consequence of delayed establishment of administra-

8.
tive structures in Lithuania, the Commission recalls that the other benchmarks have been fully met.

9.
While lack of commitment, poor management and poor working relations may have affected the respective projects,
these are general negative factors that can affect any kind of project. These factors are not specific for twinning as an
institution-building instrument.