As part of its ongoing work on the EU Technical Assistance Facility for Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All) project, Revelle helped to prepare the practical guidelines for the staff of the EU’s Delegations worldwide (European External Action Service), who are in charge of preparing and monitoring sectorial budget support in sustainable energy.
Budget support is one of the EU’s cooperation tools with partner countries, aiming at delivering better assistance and support towards sustainable development. EU budget support involves the transfer of financial resources to the National Treasury of any partner country under specific conditions to be agreed between both parties.
In the context of the EU’s Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL) Initiative, budget support acts as a catalyst for the beneficiary government in the setting-up and implementation of its sustainable energy policy and its SE4All action agenda. It aims at improving the enabling environment, to attract investments, reduce energy poverty and to boost sustainable growth. Budget support is usually implemented through a Sector Reform Contract. As a prerequisite for its success, it requires political capacity and willingness to implement the appropriate reforms and financial measures to guarantee the sustainable development of the energy sector. In practical terms, it mainly consists in: i) the preparation and implementation of reforms regarding sustainable energy policy; ii) funding of financial instruments, investments and specialized institutions and companies through state’s budget; and iii) supporting regulations and control of the different subsectors in the energy field (i.e. biomass, oil, gas, etc.), as well as their utilization (i.e. energy efficiency).
Revelle produced a Methodological Note on Sector Budget Support Programme. The note provides practical guidelines to EU staff in delegation who are in charge to prepare and monitor sectorial budget support in sustainable energy. One of its main conclusions is that sectorial budget support can be an appropriate tool to strengthen the political dialogue with the beneficiary countries as well as to support their sustainable energy policy implementation.
More information on EU’s Technical Assistance Facility for Sustainable Energy for All Initiative is available here.
