EU’s aid to Georgia over past seven years amounts to €938.4 mln

The EU helped Georgia with €938.4 million between 2014 and 2020, the recently released document, which evaluated the assistance provided to Georgia by the bloc over the past seven years, said. 

In the document, which was released by the EU representation in Georgia on Monday, the “limited progress” in terms of both judicial reform and human rights was provided among the shortcomings.

It said that agriculture and rural development had the largest share [€253 million] of the aid given in seven years, followed by connectivity [€171 million], economic development and market opportunities [€168 million], justice and democratic governance [€109 million], public administration reform and public financial management [€90 million].

The evaluation document made a mention of the assistance in the field of justice, stating that “significant progress” has been made over years, including gender-based violence, juvenile justice, legal aid and access to justice. “However, the progress achieved in the field of independence of the judicial system is small. Cases of retreat in the fields of democracy and human rights are obvious.”

Over the aid in the agricultural sector, the European Union wrote that the “positive impact on both agriculture and rural development in terms of yield and production growth was lower than expected, and the socio-economic results are difficult to determine”.

“However, EU assistance to Georgia has contributed to good progress in terms of sanitary and phytosanitary measures and food safety, and the introduction of innovative approaches in the direction of rural and integrated territorial development.”

In the field of public administration, the document stressed the “increasing accountability and transparency”.  However, it noted that the public trust in government institutions has declined and that the capacity in many public institutions remained low.