Annual Report 2007 Jaspers Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions • Jaspers Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions JASPERS Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions JASPERS 2 Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 3 JASPERS Index I. Narrative report 4 ➾ 1. Institutional issues and organisation 4 ➾ 2. Organisational development 4 ➾ 3. Operational activities 8 ➾ 4. Detailed commentary by sector 12 II. Financial information 17 ➾ 1. The budget of year 2007 17 ➾ 2. Summary of the Action: income and expenditure and payments received 17 Appendices 18 ➾ 1. Human Resources as of December 31, 2007 18 ➾ 2. Status of JASPERS assignments as of December 31, 2007 19 ➾ 3. JASPERS assignment list as at December 31, 2007 21 ➾ 4. JASPERS cumulative assignments and outcomes to December 31, 2007 25 ➾ 5. List of completed assignments 2007 per country and per sector 27 ➾ 6. Financial statement of the “Action / JASPERS” for the year to December 31, 2007 28 JASPERS 4 Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 I. Narrative report This is the Annual Report for 2007 which was an important year for JASPERS since it was the first full year of operations. There was a significant build-up in staffing throughout the year, bring- ing the number of professional staff close to the total number of technical experts envisaged by the stakeholders when JASPERS was established. 1. Institutional issues and organisation 2. Organisational development 1.1 Governance and reporting 2.1 JASPERS recruitment and staffing Meetings of the Steering Committee comprising Following an intensive screening process in the lat- representatives of the three stakeholders (European er stages of 2006, interviews for the majority of the Commission, European Investment Bank and Euro- 32 Technical Expert posts funded by the European pean Bank for Reconstruction and Development) Commission were completed by March 2007. Pre- were held on 27th March, 17th July and 16th November ferred candidates were offered positions as they 2007. The Commission chairs the Steering Commit- were identified and 28 Technical Experts plus one tee and EIB provides the Secretariat. There were also Commission-funded support staff member joined regular staff-level meetings between JASPERS senior JASPERS between January and September 2007. management and DG REGIO during the year. JASPERS had some 56 full-time staff in post at the end of December 2007 (plus four members of staff recruit- The JASPERS Annual Report for 2006 was approved ed by year’s end with an agreement to take up their by the Steering Committee during the meeting post in early 2008) compared to 16 staff one year ear- which was held on 16th November 2007. lier. The significant growth in staff numbers is shown in Figure 1. 1.2 2007 Contribution Agreements New staff were distributed between JASPERS Head The 2007 Contribution Agreement between the Office in Luxembourg and the three Regional Of- European Commission and the EIB was signed on fices (see Section 2.2, infra). They all underwent an 16th November 2007. The 2007 Contribution Agree- initial induction period in Luxembourg before trans- ment between the EIB and the EBRD was signed on ferring to their final work location and receiving an 21st December 2007. ini tial portfolio of assignments. This rapid build-up in staff numbers was assisted by existing JASPERS staff 1.3 2008 Budget which helped to integrate the new experts. The Tech- nical Experts became fully operational throughout The JASPERS budget for 2007 was agreed at the the year, supporting the build-up in the assignments meeting of the Steering Committee on 12th Decem- portfolio identified in Section 3.3. ber 2006. The JASPERS budget for 2008 was agreed by the Steering Committee on 16th November 2007. JASPERS became a largely project-focussed organ- One new post was approved by the committee which isation during 2007: of the staff at the end of 2007, also decided to review the budget in mid 2008 in the 36 were engaged in providing project assistance light of emerging needs to identify whether further (69% of staff in post, 81% of professional staff in resources would be needed. post). A further five provided geographic and coun- Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 5 JASPERS try relationship management (9% of staff in post), At end-2007 JASPERS was now close to the total two posts providing strategic direction and admin- number of Technical Experts envisaged by the stake- istration (4%), 3 staff members providing general holders at its foundation. coordination and database management (6%), and 10 support staff (15%). JASPERS is also highly region- In all, the EIB contributed the equivalent of almost alised, with 60% of staff based in the Regional Of fices, 16 staff-years equivalent in 2007. The EBRD contribu- including 70% of Technical Experts. ted with 3 man-years of professional staff time. Figure 1: JASPERS staff by activity, January-December 2007 Staff in post 50 40 30 20 10 0 01/07 02/07 03/07 04/07 05/07 06/07 07/07 08/07 09/07 10/07 11/07 12/07 Strategic direction and administration Country relationship management Staff assigned to projects – Bucharest Staff assigned to projects – Vienna Staff assigned to projects – Warsaw Staff assigned to projects – Luxembourg Secretariat JASPERS 6 Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 2.2 Table 1: Regional office network Transport Sector Environmental & Energy Sector Opening Date Head of Office Secretaries Engineers Economists Engineers Economists Temporary Transport Engineer Transport Environment W Head of JASPERS Water Engineer A Regional Office Agency Staff Transport Engineer Economist Economist R January 12th, 2007 S in Warsaw – A Temporary (Vacant Post) Transport Environment W M. Majewski Energy Engineer Agency Staff (Vacant Post) Economist Economist Temporary V Head of JASPERS Transport Engineer Water Engineer I Regional Office Agency Staff Transport Environment E May 2nd, 2007 N in Vienna – Economist Economist N Temporary A Transport Engineer Energy Engineer A. Hörhager Agency Staff Temporary Transport Engineer Solid Waste Engineer Environment B U Head of JASPERS Agency Staff Economist C Transport Engineer Water Engineer H Regional Office in Transport A June 7th, 2007 Energy Engineer R Bucharest – Economist E Environment S N. Yiambides (Vacant Post) (Vacant Post) Solid Waste Engineer T Economist (Vacant Post) The staffs of the regional offices are intended, at full Ahner, EIB Vice-President Matthias Kollatz-Ahnen and strength, to consist of a Head of Office, Technical Ex- Alexander Auboeck, Business Group Director of EBRD. perts (engineers and economists) and support staff. The opening was preceded by a workshop present- Some of the vacant posts still remained to be filled ing completed and ongoing JASPERS assignments at end-2007. Out of the six secretarial posts to be in the region to representatives of administrations of filled, five have been occupied since the openings the four countries served from Vienna. Six Technical of the three external offices by temporary agency Experts plus two support staff were based there at staff. The recruitment process for these posts was the end of 2007 (see Table 1). ongoing at end 2007. The transport sector expert posts took slightly longer than expected to re- The JASPERS Southern Region office in Bucharest source: at end 2007 three posts were still vacant. has been temporarily established in the offices of the European Commission. It was officially opened on The JASPERS Northern Region office in Warsaw was 7th June 2007, by Mssrs. Ahner, Kollatz-Ahnen and officially opened on 12th January 2007 by EU Com- Auboeck. Work continued throughout 2007 to iden- missioner Danuta Hübner, EIB President Philippe tify a permanent JASPERS office in Bucharest, which Maystadt and EBRD Secretary General Horst Reichen- is expected to be occupied in 2008. The existing office bach. The Warsaw office provides a focus for the had nine Technical Experts, one Country Officer and JASPERS presence in the region, as well as facili- one support staff at the end of 2007 (see Table 1). ties for JASPERS meetings with beneficiaries. Eight Technical Experts plus two support staff (see Table 1) Further details of human resources as at 31st Decem- were based there at the end of 2007, with a further ber 2007 form Appendix I. one EBRD staff member based in Warsaw. 2.3 Monitoring and database The JASPERS Central Europe Regional office in Vien- na began operations on 12th March and was officially The first version of a new integrated database cov- opened on 2nd May by DG Regio Director General Dirk ering projects, consultancy contracts and financial Joint Assistance to Support Projects in European Regions Annual Report 2007 7 JASPERS issues was brought into use in October 2007. This Some of the assignments included horizontal studies database, which was manually set up by the newly relevant to several projects. recruited JASPERS database manager, provided a range of reports on JASPERS assignments for the Figure 2: beneficiary countries and DG REGIO. Overall distribution of procurement procedures relat- ing to JASPERS consultancy assignments in 2007 A contract to develop the database into a modular 25 integrated management tool was signed on 15 No- vember 2007 with an external IT company. The new JASPERS database will be built around the following 20 key activity elements: Action Plan, Projects, Consult- ants, and Documents. The development of phases 15 1 and 2 of the new integrated database took place in November and December 2007, with full operational capacity to follow in 2008. 10 2.4 Development of performance indicators 5 A paper proposing JASPERS’ approach to develop- ing quantitative and qualitative indicators of per- 0 formance was agreed by the Steering Committee at Other procurement its meeting on 16 November 2007.