As part of the Hungarian Presidency of the Central European Initiative (CEI) and the Visegrád Group (V4) a conference entitled “Effective Public Administration as a Tool for Promoting Growth” was held on 29 November 2013 in Budapest.

The event provided a platform to present the Hungarian territorial public administration reform and modernisation process, launched in 2010, as well as discuss the experiences of operating the Budapest and County Government Offices and the District Offices.

The conference was addressed by Tibor Navracsics, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Administration and Justice who said: the government aims Hungary to be stronger, more competitive so that the country can become the key driver of economic growth in Europe. He added: all the reforms implemented in the field of public administration had to be subordinated to this end.

The welcome speech was delivered by Alternate Secretary General; Deputy Secretary General Margit Waetfelt, representing the Central European Initiative (CEI).

The professional event provided an opportunity for countries of the Central and Eastern European region to share best practices and lessons learnt from various solutions for territorial public administration reforms. On behalf of Hungary, Tibor Navracsics, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Public Administration and Justice, Erika Szabó, Minister of State for Territorial Public Administration and János Hargitai, Government Commissioner spoke about the experiences and results of the ongoing reforms in Hungary. 

Nearly all CEI and V4 member states were represented at the conference; the delegates of partner ministries in charge of territorial public administration and Hungarian delegations exchanged their views with each other. There were informative presentations given by experts from Poland, Croatia, Slovakia, as well as from non-EU CEI countries, such as Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania and Macedonia.

The professional event was also attended by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the European Association of State Territorial Representatives (EASTR). Based on the experiences of international organisations, the experts provided information on major European trends concerning territorial public administration.

(Ministry of Public Administration and Justice)