City of Belgrade has joined NIS corporate programme of providing support to projects that aim at contributing to the community development through open competitions "Together for the Community". On this occasion, NIS CEO, Kirill Kravchenko and the Belgrade Authorities Interim President, Siniša Mali, have signed the Strategic Cooperation Agreement. In accordance with the signed Agreement, NIS will allocate 20 million dinars for the best projects of citizens associations from Belgrade, to be selected in an open competition this year. The projects will concern sports, culture, environment, science and providing assistance to socially vulnerable groups. Since 2009, as part of a corporate programme "Cooperation for Development," NIS has provided social and economic support to the communities where it conducts its operations. In the last three years, the programme has been enhanced by the introduction of public competitions through which 100 per cent of the funds have been distributed since last year. The competition is open to non-profit institutions, while the Projects shall be selected by the Committee consisting of the strategic partners and NIS representatives. "We are pleased that City of Belgrade has joined our corporate programme of providing support to local communities. Since 2009. we have supported more than 450 projects promoting talented professionals, artists and individuals throughout Serbia, investing more than 680 million dinars. This year, through public competitions more than 110 million will be granted for projects to be implemented in 11 local self-governments. In addition to the “Together for Community” public competition, NIS supports education in faculties and vocational high schools through the social responsibility program called “Energy of Knowledge” and youth employment through the “NIS Chance” Programme. NIS has invested nearly 400 million dinars in these two programs since 2009," said Kiril Kravchenko, NIS CEO. After Belgrade, NIS intends to sign Agreements with Novi Sad, Zrenjanin, Pančevo, Niš, Kikinda, Subotica, Novi Bečej, Srbobran, Žitište and Čačak. Detailed information on the public competition: Call for Public Competition for citizens associations and other non-profit institutions in 11 municipalities and cities, shall start tomorrow, 14 March and shall close on 4 April. Detailed requirements and rules of the open competition will be posted on the corporate NIS website at: zajednicizajedno.nis.eu. Interested parties can fill out an online application on the website or send their proposal by email to the following address: zajednici.zajedno@nis.eu . The competition results will be announced by 30 May 2014, while the deadline for the implementation of projects is scheduled for the end of 2014.
