Vienna - The 5th meeting of SEE 2020 Strategy Monitoring Committee, organised by the Regional Cooperation Council (RCC), took place in Vienna on 1 December 2017.

Given the time frame of the SEE 2020 Strategy implementation and monitoring cycle, participants of today's meeting kicked start the new monitoring cycle, agreeing on the new timetable for collection of data on the Strategy’s implementation for the Annual Report on Implementation (ARI).

The participants also looked back on the last years monitoring cycle, focusing on the main challenges and ways to address them, timeframe and modalities, based on which they discussed the scope and timeframe for 2018, including distribution of roles and responsibilities among national administrations, regional dimension coordinators and the RCC. They also heard presentation of findings of another SEE 2020 monitoring tool - Balkan Barometer Survey 2017.
Furthermore, the participants were debriefed by the RCC team on the outcomes from the Eurostat’s Workshop on the SEE 2020 Indicators. The participants also took note on the expected impact monitoring on Roma Integration according to regionally adopted standards.

Finally, the meeting included an update on the cooperation established with the international organisations, such as ETF and OECD, using the data form the SEE 2020 monitoring process for the purpose of better coordination, in terms of data exchange and data collection timelines, in an attempt to avoid overlap.

SEE 2020 Monitoring Committee oversees the overall process of monitoring the Strategy and proposes any changes to optimize the process or modify the scope of monitoring. It consists of the appointed high-level officials at the level of Assistant Minister or State Secretary from the governments of South East Europe covered by SEE 2020 Strategy and a representative of the RCC Secretariat.