HUNGARY: New Hungarian National Development Plan

Every EU member state has to present a document to the European Commission specifiing the areas on which it wants to spend financial allocation in the EU budget years 2007-2013. It is calculated that in a seven-year period Hungary would be able to spend about EUR 28 billion on development. The government agency responsible for development issues in Hungary prepared the draft of the second National Development Plan (the first was prepared for the years 2004-2006) under the heading “New Hungarian Development Plan?. It was published parallel to an official month-long consulting period starting in August 2006 and ending in September 2006. During this reflection period 280 opinions were put forward from all sectors, civil society organisations have been especially active in this process. Among the many opinions put forward by individual organisations a common declaration signed by 290 Hungarian civil organisations was also prepared. Initiated, among others, by European House, the common declaration was critical of the Hungarian development plan and emphasised the importance of social cohesion, active citizenship, community development and civil society in general. On one of the last occasions before the plan tabled in the Hungarian Parliament and then in the European Commission, a conference was organised by European House on the 11th of September 2006 with Mr Gordon Bajnai, head of the National Development Agency, as keynote speaker. Participants once again emphasised the importance of civil activism and a well-developed civil society in Hungary as a prerequisite for a successful implementation of the National Development Plan. The activity of civil society organisations has to be kept up since the National Development Plan provides only the framework, the concrete projects will be identified in the subsequent operational programmes which are due to be completed in the upcoming months.