• European Commission
• Enlargement
• How does it work?
• Technical assistance

Pre-Accession Assistance – Twinning

The Twinning programme aims to help beneficiary countries to develop modern and efficient administrations, with the structures, human resources and management skills needed to implement the EU acquis. Since the programme's launch in 1998, over 1,100 Twinning projects have been launched in beneficiary countries.

The programme provides a framework for administrations and semi-public organisations in the beneficiary countries to work with their counterparts in the Member States to facilitate the transposition, enforcement and implementation of EU legislation.Twinning projects set out to deliver specific, guaranteed results. The parties agree in advance on a detailed work programme to meet an objective concerning priority areas of the acquis, as set out in the Accession Partnerships.

Member State administrations provide core teams of long-term seconded experts to new Member States, acceding, candidate or potential candidate countries. Each Twinning project has at least one Resident Twinning Adviser (RTA) and a Project Leader. The RTA is seconded from a Member State administration or from another approved body in a Member State. He or she works full time for a minimum of 12 months in the corresponding ministry in the partner country to implement the project. Project Leaders are responsible for the overall thrust and coordination of the work. In addition, there are carefully planned and timed missions by other specialists; training events; and awareness raising visits to drive the reform process towards the desired result.

Upcoming deadlines for circulated Twinning project fiches (21 May 2012) [121 KB]

Results for the fiches launched [27 KB]

Latest issue of Twinning News No 49 - March 2012 [236 KB]

Twinning news Special - per diems July 2011 [84 KB]

Twinning news no 48 - June 2011 [82 KB]

Twinning news no 47 - February 2011 [83 KB]

Twinning News Special - per diems 1st semester 2011 [72 KB]

Twinning news no 45 - September 2010 [353 KB]

Twinning news no 44 - July 2010 [88 KB]

Twinning news no 43 - December 2009 [297 KB]

Twinning news no 42 - December 2009 [94 KB]

Twinning news no 41 - November 2009 [136 KB]

Twinning news no 40 - August 2009 [206 KB]

Twinning news no 39 - July 2009 [235 KB]

Twinning news no 38 - June 2009 [167 KB]

Twinning news no 37 - January 2009 [300 KB]

Twinning news no 36 - December 2008 [139 KB]

Twinning news no 34 - August 2008 [111 KB]

Twinning news no 33 - July 2008 [80 KB]

Twinning news no 32 - June 2008 [178 KB]

Twinning news no 31 - June 2007 [249 KB]

Twinning news no 30 - April 2007 [241 KB]

Twinning news no 29 - December 2007 [123 KB]

Twinning news no 28 - November 2007 [209 KB]

Twinning news no 27 - October 2007 [867 KB]

More information

• Twinning Brochure: Building Europe Together [470 KB]
• Twinning statistics [472 KB]
• Twinning network:
  • National Contact Points 'Institution Building' - Member States [103 KB] - May 2012
  • National Contact Points 'Institution Building' - Candidate Countries [74 KB] - April 2012
  • National Contact Points 'Institution Building' – Potential Candidates [12 KB] - March 2012

Evaluations

• Evaluation on Twinning versus Technical Assistance [2 MB]
• DG Enlargement Thematic Report: From Pre-Accession to Accession [541 KB] – March 2004
• An Evaluation of Completed Twinning Projects [162 KB] - January 2003
• Court of Auditors: Special Report [239 KB] concerning Twinning as the main instrument to support Institution Building in candidate countries – July 2003
• Twinning Evaluations by Member States
• • Evaluation of twinning projects led by Germany [2 MB]

Useful links

• Upcoming deadlines for circulated Twinning project fiches (05 July 2010) [74 KB]
• Results for the fiches launched [23 KB]
• Twinning Manual 2012 and Annexes (valid for all Twinning contracts for which the official letter of notification of selection is issued as from 2 April 2012):
  • Twinning Manual 2012 [520 KB]
  • Annexes [742 KB]
  • Overview of main changes Manual 2012 [8 KB]
• Twinning Manual 2009 and Annexes (valid for all Twinning contracts for which the official letter of notification of selection is issued as from 15 September 2009):
  • Twinning Manual 2009 [496 KB]
  • Annexes [688 KB]
    New template Annex C7 (for IPA) – Selection Fact Sheet (March 2011) [68 KB]
  • Main revisions Manual 2009 [72 KB]

The French and German translations of the Manual and its annexes can be obtained upon request (elarg-twinning@ec.europa.eu). The translation of the 2012 Manual will be available shortly.

• List of Mandated Bodies [832 KB] – (NEW)
• Privacy statement in Twinning [47 KB]
• Recommended EuropassCV format [102 KB] for Twinning Project Proposal

You can also create a Europass CV here.

You may also consult the webpage of the EuropeAid co-operation office on Twinning