EEA Financial Mechanisms

Period: 1 May 2004–30 April 2009

Budget: EUR 600 million

The EEA Financial Mechanisms provides financial assistance to the 10 new EU and EEA Member States to help the new Member States fully participate in the internal market and to reduce the social and economic inequalities within the larger EU and EEA.

The EEA is made up of three non-EU member states, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway , who all participate in the EU internal market. As a member of EEA, Norway contributes EUR 113.4 million annually to the EEA Mechanism but controls its own Mechanism as well, for more information on the Norwegian Financial Mechanism, click here .

The Mechanism was started in 1994 by the EEA-EFTA Member States as well as former EFTA States, Austria, Finland and Sweden and provided grants to Greece, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Portugal and Spain with the goal of ensuring an equal playing field for the internal market.

This stage continues to provide grants to Greece, Portugal and Spain but focuses the grants on the new EEA member states: Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia.

The EEA Financial Mechanism provides grants in the following areas as well as for research in these areas:

• Environment

• Sustainable development

• European cultural heritage

• Human resources

• Health and childcare

The EEA Financial Mechanism is guided by the Financial Mechanism Committee (FMC), made up of Norwegian, Icelandic and Liechtenstein representatives, who decide which projects receive grants. Since the EEA and Norwegian Mechanisms have the same objective and are similar in nature, the FMC and Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs work together to coordinate the awarding of grants.

More information