October 4 (SeeNews) - The European Commission approved financing of nearly 3 billion levs ($1.52 billion/1.53 billion euro) to Bulgaria over the next five years, to help foster technological innovation, digitalisation and energy efficiency, the innovation ministry said on Tuesday.
The funds will be disbursed to micro-, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) under Bulgaria's operational programme Competitiveness and Innovations during the new 2021-2027 programming period, the ministry said in a press release.
The programme's implementation is expected to start by the end of the current year.
As a first step, Bulgarian MSMEs will be able to apply for 127 million levs in funding for research and development of new technologies. Applications for a total of 117.5 million levs for improving production capacity should start being accepted in early 2023. Close to 300 million levs will be available for small businesses to implement innovative processes.
Bulgaria applied for EU Commission approval of the programme in early August.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)