Press Release

EU and UNDP have finalized the selection of local authorities under “Mayors for Economic Growth” Programme in Azerbaijan

28 July 2022

Grants were presented to 6 Azerbaijani local authorities on the regional "Show&Tell" platform organized within the framework of the "Mayors for Economic Growth" program implemented by the United Nations Development Program in Eastern Partnership countries with the financial support of the European Union.

Calls for proposals was open from May 20 to June 30, 2022. Applicant local authorities were invited to propose their ideas for the Portfolio Journey and Urban Imaginaries directions.

In order to ensure more active participation of local auhtorities in the program, Information Sessions for program members were organized in the cities of Lankaran, Ganja, Sheki and Baku on May 31-June 3 2022.

8 applications for Portfolio Journey and 22 applications for Urban Imaginaries were received. 3 applications for Portfolio Journey and 5 applications for Urban Imaginaries that passed the preliminary evaluation were invited to the next stage and went through the interview process on July 14, 2022 with the participation of the European Union Delegation to Azerbaijan, the Istanbul Regional Hub and Azerbaijan Country Office of the United Nations Development Program.

On July 18, the results of the selection stage were evaluated by the representatives of the regional offices of the European Union and the United Nations Development Program, and as a result, Xirdalan city municipality, the Administration of State Historical-Architectural Reserve "Icherisheher" were selected for Portfolio Journey and Mingachevir, Naftalan, Sabail və Urva local authorities for Urban Imaginaries.

Portfolio Journey is a strategic learning mechanism to tackle complex challenges and selected local authorities will be working on tackling several challenges over the next two years.

Urban Imaginaries is a way to design catalytic interventions and selected local authorities will work to implement specific interventions on a selected project in a short period of time (up to 6 months).

Selected local authorities will be provided with technical support, capacity building and financial support for the implementation of their projects. It should be noted that the "Mayors for Economic Growth" program started in Azerbaijan in March of this year and 50 municipalities across Azerbaijan joined the program.