The First Outreach Mission Leaves End of March

ZAGREB, 19 March 2012 – The end of March is the due date for the first of a total of eight Outreach missions organised within the EU IPA Project ″Development of Investment Climate″. The budget allocated for this component of the Project amounts to 70.000,00 EUR.

Sisak-Moslavina county starts the series of eight trips and it will present its investment opportunities in the semiconductor industry to selected USA companies. The county team managed to organise a total of ten meetings. The following counties are designed to participate to the 2012 Outreach missions: Brod-Posavina, Lika-Senj, Osijek-Baranja, Požega-Slavonia, Sisak-Moslavina, Virovitica-Podravina, Vukovar-Srijem and Zagreb County.

The Outreach missions are organised and implemented jointly by a team made of representatives of the eight counties and the Ministry of Economy. The campaigns will be organised in the period from March to June and the county teams will travel to European and Far East countries as well as USA. The Croatian delegation will use this mission to present to selected foreign investors investment opportunities in Croatia.

Investor Outreach is a proactive form of marketing aimed at identifying and attracting foreign investments in the Republic of Croatia. The purpose of Investor Outreach programme is the identification and preparation of potential projects, selected by the Counties, for the attraction of foreign direct investments (FDI). This targeted approach to foreign investors, adapted to the local needs/conditions, is used by almost all the countries in FDI attraction process. These activities are the continuation of the Outreach programme from 2011 when 12 Croatian counties (out of the 20 involved in the Project) participated in 10 Outreach campaigns which resulted in a number of visits by renowned investors to Croatia boosting the interest for investment in Croatia. Last year budget for the Outreach campaigns amounted to 90.000,00 EUR.

About ICPR3 programme:
EU project “Development of Investment Climate“ is implemented using the IPA III C pre-accession assistance and is the continuation of two previous stages of the Investment Certification Programme for Regions (ICPR). The Project is designed to provide strategic development and training to 20 Croatian counties, to help them be adequately prepared for attracting foreign direct investment (FDI). The Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Crafts is the beneficiary of the Project and is responsible for its implementation. The Project is one of the most valuable services projects financed through EU funds currently implemented in Croatia. Following the extension granted in September 2011, the total value of the project amounts to €3.44 million. The project will be implemented over a period of 32 months, and it began on 1 February 2010.