The Balkan Trust for Democracy (BTD) is grantmaking initiative that supports democracy, good governance, and Euroatlantic integration in Southeastern Europe. BTD was created in 2003 by the German Marshall Fund of the United States, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. BTD’s original ten-year mandate came to an end in May 2013. BTD then entered into its second mandate (2013-2020) with structural changes to geographic coverage and grantmaking scope.

Trade associations represent the ‘voice of business’, or of particular industrial sectors, and act as a convenient, accessible aggregator of opinion for those sectors. Policymakers tend to give greater weight to the views of trade associations than they do to individual companies. Trade associations often claim to represent tens or hundreds of thousands of jobs, and a large percentage share of particular markets, and are perceived to have a more impartial perspective than particular companies.

Whether professional consultancies, trade associations, NGOs or academic institutions, the number of stakeholders contained in the voluntary EU Transparency Register has more than doubled over the past 3 years. Any type of organisation that interacts with the EU institutions is invited to sign up and disclose who they are, what they want, who their clients are and what they spend on EU-related activities.

Companies can use the following five core elements as guiding principles for responsible engagement in climate policy.

1. Legitimacy

Legitimacy refers to a company’s approach, intentions and understanding of climate policy. Defining factors for legitimacy include:

1. Air Conditioning and Refrigeration European Association
2. Alliance for Rural Electrification (ARE)
3. Aquadev (AD)
4. Association des Constructeurs Européens d’Automobiles (ACEA)
5. Association Européenne des Expositions Scientifiques, Techniques et Industrielles (ECSITE)
6. Association of Overseas Countries and Territories of the European Union (OCTA)
7. BusinessEurope
8. Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA)
9. CECODHAS- European Liaison Committee for Social Housing (CECODHAS)
10. CEMBureau

Implementing climate change policy poses difficult political economy challenges.

99 Inter-Governmental Organisations (IGOs) and 1598 NGOs are admitted as observers at the Climate Change Convention

IGOs as Observers

The EU and its 28 Member States are fully committed to the UNFCCC negotiating process with a view to adopting a global legally binding agreement applicable to all Parties at the Paris Conference in December 2015 in line with the below 2° C objective. The Lima Conference confirmed the Warsaw decision that all Parties should communicate their 'Intended Nationally Determined Contribution ' (INDC) in the first quarter of 2015 in a manner that facilitates the clarity, transparency and understanding of the INDC.

An effective presentation before a committee requires good planning and preparation. But what about the meeting itself ? Here are some quick tips on how to conduct yourself when testifying before a parliamentary committee.