Finance Ministry to splash out on small, medium biz

"We want to contract zl.600 million. There is plenty of money left from Activity 2.2.1 (an EU program promoting competitiveness), as we have used only 49%. This will be added to funds from other unused programs," said Tomasz Nowakowski, undersecretary in the Regional Development Ministry. In his opinion, the figure designated for supporting investments will stand at zl.200 million."I would really aim at carrying out the first round of funding yet this year," said Nowakowski. He added that it would be best if the funds were distributed by the Polish Agency for Enterprise Development (PARP), but so far the parties have not signed the necessary agreement. According to Nowakowski, PARP has a lot of experience in such large programs. Moreover, the Finance Ministry was recently criticized by the EU for improper distribution of funds. (Puls Biznesu, pp.1, 9) M.M.