Financing railways: How to make the best use of EU funds Warsaw, 5 July 2012 Novotel Warszawa Centrum, ul. Marszałkowska 94/98 8:00 – 9:00 Registration and welcome coffee 9:00 – 9:15 Welcome from Libor Lochman (CER Executive Director) and Philippe Citroën (UNIFE Director General) 9:15 – 9:30 Welcome from Jakub Karnowski, President of the Management Board and Director General of PKP S.A. 9:30 – 9:45 Keynote by Elżbieta Bieńkowska, Minister for Regional Development 9:45 – 10:00 Keynote by Wolfgang Streitenberger, Adviser to the DG REGIO Director General Morning session During the morning session a representative of DG REGIO will introduce the subject by addressing questions such as: What is the purpose of Cohesion Policy? Which fund finances what? What are the funds available to finance rail infrastructure and rolling stock? What is the timing? When must funds be requested, when are they committed, what are the decomitment rules? Will future regulation change the process? Afterwards, a representative from Jaspers and a private consultant will be asked to give an overview on the major obstacles and general difficulties encountered when trying to absorb EU funding. A detailed conceptual analysis of the processes of project planning and management shall be drawn by the respective experiences: what are the problems that generally affect the funding of a project? What are the complicated aspects of the application process? Can best practices be identified? What’s the role that Jaspers or private consultants can play while assisting applicants? 10:00 – 10:30 Artur Rudnicki, Transport Economist at JASPERS - Warsaw office 10:30 – 11:00 Ioannis Kroustalis, Transport Expert at DG REGIO – European Commission 11:00 – 11:30 Q&A 11:30 – 12:00 Torsten Heid, Consultant at SYMBIOS Funding and Consulting GmbH 12:00 – 12:30 Q&A 12:30 – 14:00 Lunch Afternoon session In the afternoon case studies of projects partly funded by EU budget for TEN-T or Regional Policy will be analysed. The aim is not only to show just the positive results of the project but to single out the main problems that were overcome. 14:00 – 14:20 PKP experience with rail infrastructure financing (Presenter from PKP tbc) 14:20 – 14:40 Financing ERTMS on ÖBB rolling stock Alfred Pitnik, Head of International Affairs of Rail Cargo Austria AG 14:40 – 15:00 A case from the industry: Thales Polska Andrzej Glowiak, KAM Telecommunications at Thales Polska Wrap up and conclusions 15:00 – 15:45 Wrap up panel with Libor Lochman, Philippe Citroën and Andrzej Massel (Vice Minister for Transport)