Advisor to the Urban Development Fund (UDF) for Urban Projects Development in the Regions of Central Greece and Peloponnese through the JESSICA initiative

The Joint European Support for Sustainable Investment in City Areas (JESSICA) initiative is being developed by the European Commission and the European Investment Bank (EIB), in collaboration with the Council of Europe Development Bank (CEB).  Under this initiative Member States are being given the option of using some of their EU grant funding under the Structural Funds to make repayable investments in projects forming part of an integrated plan for sustainable urban development. These investments, which may take the form of equity, loans and/or guarantees, are delivered to projects via Urban Development Funds.  JESSICA funds could be targeted specifically at projects such as:

• urban infrastructure, including transport, water/wastewater, energy, etc.
• heritage of cultural sites for tourism or other sustainable uses
• redevelopment of brownfield sites, including site clearance and decontamination
• office space for SMEs, IT and/ or R&D sectors
• university buildings, including medical, biotech and other specialised facilities
• energy efficiency improvements.

On this purpose, Eurobank S.A. has been selected to act as the Urban Development Fund for the Regions of Central Greece and Peloponnese, and manage funds of €40mil and € 28mil respectively, for urban projects development in these regions.

KANTOR’s role was to support the development, evaluation selection and prioritization of eligible projects as well as the overall controlling, reporting and compliance assessment for each project.
KANTOR was responsible for the initial and final evaluation of each urban investment project in terms of financial and technical viability, as well as for its eligibility in relation to the financing requirements of JESSICA and the National Strategic Reference Framework. Additionally, Kantor supported the prioritization of the potential investment projects based on an agreed set of criteria and made risk assessment analysis in regards to their implementation.
Finally KANTOR supported the local authorities for maturing the investment projects focusing in the implementation of the appropriate tender processes for the selection of the required contractors.