Interreg Europe - Interregional Cooperation Programme

Interreg Europe - Interregional Cooperation Programme

Historical status

This is a historical reference page, not an announcement of an open grant round. The latest general call for Interreg Europe project proposals was the third call. It opened on 20 March 2024 and closed at noon CEST on 7 June 2024. The official programme terms of reference set aside approximately €130 million for that call. The deadline in the front matter is the closed call’s actual final date so that the archive record remains precise.

The Interreg Europe Joint Secretariat published a programme news item on 31 January 2025 asking whether there would be a fourth call. The programme’s current guidance, reflected in official programme information, is that there will be no further open calls for new project proposals through 2027. Do not treat this page as evidence that a new application window is available. If the programme changes its schedule, the official application page and a new call document should replace this archive status before anyone relies on a new date.

The programme still offers policy-learning and peer-review support through its wider services. Those services can help a region examine a policy problem or find experience from another region, but they are not the same thing as submitting a new Interreg Europe project proposal for grant funding.

What the programme funded

Interreg Europe is an EU-supported programme for interregional cooperation. It brought together public authorities and other policy-relevant organisations from different European countries to exchange experience, compare approaches, and improve regional development policy instruments. The central result was intended to be a change in a policy instrument: for example, a regional support programme, a local development strategy, an innovation measure, an implementation procedure, or another public intervention.

This distinction matters. The programme did not operate like a conventional capital grant for one organisation to buy equipment or build a facility. Projects were built around a shared policy challenge and a structured learning process. Partners studied good practices, hosted or joined interregional meetings, worked with stakeholders, and prepared action plans for applying the lessons in their own regions. A pilot action could be included or requested when a practice needed testing before it could be integrated into the policy instrument, but pilot activity was a supplement to exchange of experience rather than the programme’s main purpose.

The 2021-2027 programme period covered six broad policy groupings:

• A smarter Europe, including research, innovation, digital competitiveness, and support for small and medium-sized enterprises.
• A greener Europe, including energy efficiency, renewable energy, climate adaptation, circular economy, biodiversity, and sustainable mobility.
• A more connected Europe, including digital and transport connectivity.
• A more social Europe, including education, employment, social inclusion, integration, health, culture, and sustainable tourism.
• A Europe closer to citizens, including integrated urban and non-urban development.
• Better regional governance, including administrative capacity and the quality of policy implementation.

The third call terms allowed proposals across all programme topics. That did not remove the need for a focused proposal. A strong project still needed to identify one coherent policy problem, explain why interregional exchange was useful, and show how each participating organisation could influence the policy instrument it addressed.

Funding record for the closed call

The third call made approximately €130 million available, described in the official terms of reference as up to 40% of the overall Interreg funds budget. That is a call envelope, not an automatic award for every applicant and not a promise of €130 million for one project. The final amount depended on the quality and eligibility of submitted applications and on selection decisions.

Interreg funding normally covered either 70% or 80% of eligible project activity, depending on the legal status of the partner. Public bodies generally used the higher public-partner rate, while eligible private non-profit bodies generally used the lower rate. The applicable call and national rules determined the exact co-financing obligation. Partners from Norway and Switzerland were not eligible to receive Interreg funds under the third-call terms; they could instead use their respective national funding arrangements. A proposal therefore needed a country-by-country financing plan rather than a single assumption that every partner would receive the same rate.

Eligible project costs were connected to the approved work plan. They could include staff time, administration, travel and accommodation, external expertise, meetings, communication, and other eligible categories required to deliver the cooperation and learning work. A cost had to be necessary, documented, and consistent with the programme rules. A project budget that mainly described local purchases, standalone consultancy, or a private company’s commercial expansion would not match the programme’s intervention logic.

Who could participate

The third call covered the 27 EU Member States and the full programme partners Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Switzerland, and Ukraine. Organisations from other countries could participate only under the conditions stated in the call and generally at their own cost. Country eligibility and funding eligibility were related but not identical, so a prospective partnership had to check both before preparing a budget.

The core applicant group consisted of national, regional, and local public authorities; bodies governed by public law; and eligible private non-profit organisations. The organisation needed a meaningful connection to regional development policy, either because it was responsible for developing a policy instrument or because it had a recognised role in implementing, supporting, or influencing that instrument. A for-profit company could be a stakeholder in a project’s wider work where the rules allowed it, but it was not normally an eligible funded project partner under the general call.

The partnership had to involve organisations from at least three countries, including at least two EU Member States financed through Interreg Europe. The minimum was only a starting point. Applicants also had to show that the partnership was useful: each region needed a clear policy role, each partner needed a reason to learn from the others, and the proposed exchange needed to produce changes that could be carried into regional policy practice.

What a complete proposal required

For the closed third call, the lead applicant submitted an online application in the programme’s electronic system. The package was built around a common policy challenge and normally included the following elements:

1. A problem analysis that identified the policy issue, its regional consequences, and the policy instrument that needed improvement.
2. A description of the partnership showing the role, experience, and policy responsibility of every partner.
3. A learning and exchange method covering study visits, peer learning, comparative work, stakeholder involvement, and the transfer of relevant practices.
4. A work plan with activities, outputs, milestones, responsibilities, and a realistic sequence for the project period.
5. A policy-change or action-plan approach explaining what each region expected to improve after learning from the partnership.
6. A communication and dissemination plan that made the results useful to policy practitioners beyond the immediate partnership.
7. A budget tied to eligible cost categories, the co-financing rate for each partner, and the resources required to complete the work.
8. The required declarations and supporting material, completed with the templates and instructions in the call package.

The lead partner had to coordinate the application, assemble the declarations, check that the electronic form was complete, and submit before the call closed. The official portal terms state that the system does not accept an application after the deadline. That made the final technical check part of the submission plan: partners needed time to resolve missing fields, signatures, annexes, and validation errors before pressing submit.

Practical assessment for a future programme decision

Although no new project call is open, the closed call provides a useful screening test for organisations considering later territorial-cooperation funding. Start with the policy instrument rather than with a desired purchase. Ask which public programme, strategy, procedure, or implementation measure should change and who has authority to change it. If the answer is only a local activity or a company’s product, the idea is probably not a fit for this programme model.

Next, test the partnership. A list of countries is not enough. Each partner should bring a relevant experience, a defined learning need, access to the policy instrument, and staff time for international cooperation. The partnership should be able to explain why the same issue looks different in each region and what can realistically be transferred. It should also be clear who will continue the work after the project activities end.

Then test the financial case. Interreg Europe required co-financing, financial controls, and reporting. Public and private non-profit partners could not simply assume that all costs or all legal forms would receive the same treatment. Finance and legal staff should review eligibility, national arrangements, procurement implications, and the evidence needed for reporting before a proposal is drafted.

Finally, separate current support services from a grant application. A region may still use the official Policy Learning Platform, community, expert support, or peer-review services to investigate a policy challenge and connect with European practitioners. Those routes can be valuable preparation or standalone assistance, but they do not create a new funded project and should not be described as an open application round.

Links and verification

Use the official Interreg Europe pages for any future status change:

• Funding and application guidance: https://www.interregeurope.eu/help-centre/apply-for-funding
• Programme overview and documents: https://www.interregeurope.eu/discover-the-programme
• Activities and project-method guidance: https://www.interregeurope.eu/help-centre/apply-for-funding/activities
• Third-call terms of reference: https://www.interregeurope.eu/sites/default/files/2024-02/Interreg%20Europe%20-%20Third%20call%20terms%20of%20reference.pdf
• Programme news, including the fourth-call status item: https://www.interregeurope.eu/news-and-events/news

Before changing this page back to an active opportunity, verify a new official call notice, its eligible countries, funding envelope, co-financing rules, application system, and final submission date. Until that happens, the correct reader message is that the last general call closed on 7 June 2024 and no new project-proposal round has been announced through 2027.