Speaking after talks with EU Regional Policy Commissioner Johannes Hahn, he said conditions had been created to draw the funds as of early 2014 after the European Parliament on Wednesday adopted a law package required to enforce the cohesion policy in the 2014-20 period, when Croatia can count on EUR 8.03 billion from cohesion and structural funds.
Grcic said projects worth EUR 250 million were already being implemented in Croatia and that projects worth EUR 480 million were ready for tenders. "That's more than EUR 700 million, which guarantees a good start to the absorption of funds, both from pre-accession instruments and from structural funds."
Grcic said Croatia would not end this year as a country which paid more into the European budget than it received.
"A reaccreditation of the system is under way, which is a condition for a EUR 150 million downpayment, but even without that we would wrap up this year about EUR 10 million in the black. If we receive this money next year, we will be in the black for twice that amount next year, so it's not crucial whether we get the downpayment by the end of this year or in January or February next year."
System reaccreditation is complex but can be completed in a few months, Grcic said, adding that accreditation for pre-accession instruments had taken two years.
He said that in the spring Croatia would submit a final version of a partner agreement to the European Commission, a key document for drawing European funds and a basis for operational programmes.
"At the meeting with Hahn, we considered all the obstacles in our way, we presented the pace next year at which we will prepare the operational programmes relating to this partner agreement. It's important to stress that Croatia is not late. It is doing this job in parallel with other countries. The aggravating circumstance for us is that in these 18 or 24 months we have to do a double job, documents for the second half of 2013 and documents for the seven-year period, which is a huge job."
Grcic said there was no mention of the work on a preliminary feasibility study on the best way to connect Croatia's south with the rest of the country, but that according to his information, the presentation of the study was delayed for seven days because consultants were ill. The document was to have been presented on November 21.