On 20 December 2016, the EU Info Centre in BiH and Creative Europe Desk BiH jointly organised an event to mark the 25th anniversary of MEDIA, a sub-programme within Creative Europe – the European Commission’s framework programme for support to the culture and audio-visual sectors.

The European Union secured Bosnia and Herzegovina’s membership in the Creative Europe programme in June 2014 through the IPA I programme, when it provided EUR 184.500 for the entry ticket in order to enable BiH to participate in the programme.

Head of the Operations Section for Social Development, Civil Society and Cross Border Co-operation at the Delegation of the European Union to BiH, Massimo Mina, explained the history and the general goal of the programme.

“Previous programmes such as Culture, MEDIA and MEDIA Mundus have been brought together under Creative Europe. The programme is open to cultural and creative organisations from EU Member States, as well as non-EU Member States. In this way, EU support helps thousands of artists and cultural professionals to work across borders and reach new audiences, new markets,” Mina said.

Head of Creative Europe MEDIA Desk BiH Zoran Galić recognised the great potential of the programme, in particular for BiH filmmakers who are most often granted projects within the programme.

“Since BiH joined the MEDIA programme in 2013, fifty-seven projects were approved, with the total support of EUR 1.129.817. These are great results and the Creative Europe Desk BiH is here to help applicants to further surpass these results in the coming years,” Galić said.

Head Coordinator of the Creative Europe Desk BiH and Head of CULTURE Desk Aida Kalender shared her optimistic views for perspective BiH applicants within the CULTURE sub-programme calls for proposal.

“During the last two years we have worked hard to improve capacities of the potential beneficiaries in BiH. I am particularly pleased to announce that during the last call for applications, for the first time we had BiH organisations as leading partners, nine of them to be precise,” Kalender concluded.

Assistant Minister for Science and Culture at the BiH Ministry of Civil Affairs Biljana Čamur Veselinović commended the audio-visual sector in the country for its continuous efforts to join the programme.

Representatives of the beneficiaries, filmproducer Amra Bakšić Čamo and Head of Industry at the Sarajevo Film Festival Jovan Marjanović, shared their experiences in the successful application and implementation process.

The event was concluded with a music performance of some of the most memorable movie music pieces by the String Quartet of the Sarajevo Philharmonic Orchestra, a beneficiary of the programme.

Creative Europe is the European Commission’s framework programme for support to the culture and audio-visual sectors. The sub-programme MEDIA is the follow-up of the successful MEDIA 2007 programme aiming to strengthen the capacities of the audio-visual sector, which includes support to development and distribution of feature and animated movies, creative documentaries and video games, co-financing of film festivals promoting European films, building skills and capacities of audio-visual sector professionals, etc.

All info on open calls and BiH participation are available on the Creative Europe Desk BiH’s website: http://www.kreativnaevropa.ba/

More info about the 25th anniversary of the MEDIA sub-programme is available on the link: https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/25-years-media-programme

Info about Creative Europe is available on the link: https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/creative-europe/