Albania

To promote and facilitate the international support of decentralized cooperation for an integrated, participatory and sustainable local development in line with local and national priorities and within the global framework of the Millenium Development Goals.

The Art Gold Albania Programme is funded from Italian Government and will implement the successful practice and strategies applied in the country through UNDP LGP and UNOPS PASARP programmes using decentralized cooperation as a modality for supporting the Government in implementing the local plans and strategies to achieve the MDG at the local level. It will provide a framework for decentralized cooperation that supports the central and local government to coordinate and link different contributions in supporting integrated local development.

At the local level the project’s main focus will be to strengthen local stakeholders capacities in planning and managing integrated territorial development, using participatory methodologies open to decentralized cooperation international partnership opportunities. The project will concentrate its operations at the regional, municipal and commune levels to support the preparation of refining of planning documents, action plans as well as support the monitoring process.

At the national level the project will help enhancing central government concerned departments capacities to support the development of regions, municipalities and communes of the country through the decentralized cooperation modality.

At the international level the project will use the decentralized cooperation modality to promote the exchange of innovations, experiences and good practices with other southern and northern countries in view of the internationalization of Albanian cultural, economic and social reality.

• Support the national government in framing and implementing decentralization and regional development policies that will be supportive to the achievement of the MDG and NSDI goals in a coordinated way and in partnership with various stakeholders
• Enhance the capacities of the regional and local government and other stakeholders of selected regions in local planning , implementation and monitoring process and support in the initiation of the implementation of regional development strategies.
• Link and form partnership among Albanian and European and other’s regional and local authorities and communities for initiating development interventions oriented towards implementing the local plans and strategies and achieving the MDG for fostering cultural dialogue and European integrations of Albania.

Hub for Innovative partnerships/ Art Office in Geneva, Ministry of Interior, regional and local authorities , existing Local Economic Development Agencies, National and Regional/Local Working Groups

The ART Gold Programme will be implemented by UNDP, in accordance with UNDP’s Direct Execution (DEX) modality.