On the 19th April 2021, the second Steering Committee meeting of the Twinning Project for the National Bank of Ukraine (hereinafter - NBU) was held online.
The project is being implemented with the participation of the Narodowy Bank Polski and the Lietuvos bankas and aims to achieve macroeconomic stability in Ukraine by increasing the institutional capacity of the National Bank of Ukraine, as well as by establishing reliable banking and payment infrastructure.
The Steering Committee meeting was attended by key Project figures on behalf of the Member Sates, the Beneficiary administration and the EU Delegation to Ukraine.
Chief Consultant of the Twinning Coordination Sector of the Twinning Administrative Office Tetiana Musiienko participated in the meeting as an observer.
During the Committee, the participants submitted Interim semi-annual report as of 31.03.2021 as well as the Work Plan for the next quarter (until 30.06.2021) and the next half-year (until 31.10.2021). Both Report, and the Work plan were approved by the EUD.
The RTA Dariusz Lewandowski reported that “the progress of the Project is in terms of time frame and achievement of the goals. No special problems have been identified along the development of the mentioned activities”.
Since the RTA have worked in online format during the reporting period, significant amount of work was devoted to the analysis of the NBU regulatory framework and other preparatory actions that are most efficient to implement in such circumstances (remote mode). Although some actions were impossible to implement remotely, overall, it has been conducted 18 online missions with their fair even distribution amidst all four components in the reporting period.
The representatives of the National Bank of Poland introduced to the participants of the meeting their own know-how - extremely effective and transparent application for financial management and budget distribution costs of the Project that have been lately. The meeting also raised the issue of the eligibility of redistribution of the Project funds saved due to the online format of the RTA work and online missions for additional activities such as conducting additional missions, attracting more experts etc. This issue to be considered by the EUD, and if agreed, will be fixed in additional agreement to the contract.
It was noted that fewer missions are planned in the next reporting period, as the main task in the next quarter is to discuss with market stakeholders the most attractive model of instant payment system in the end of April and its implementation in end of October.
Thus, in the next period it is planned to hold 15 activities with the involvement of 40 short-term experts from the Banks of Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and the Netherlands, as well as 45 employees of the NBU.
The Project Adviser will continue to coordinate the Project online until 30 June 2021 as provided in the European Commission Crisis Declaration. The online format of the RTA’s work can be extended if the European Commission extends the Crisis Declaration, so the Work Plan for the next reporting period (August-October) might be also amended. This and other issues to be discussed at the next 3d meeting of the Steering Committee on July 21, 2021.
