The EU-funded Mayors for Economic Growth (M4EG) initiative, implemented by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), launches a new chapter of a Mission-Oriented Economy Journey with 6 new municipalities to join the programme and foster its resilience and local economic growth.

This is up to a year-long journey in the seed phase, where selected municipalities will engage closely with UNDP in a learning journey to create mission-oriented portfolios and implement designed interventions.

A total of up to $60,000 (approximately EUR 51,500) of financial support is available through a phased approach: 

• Provision of up to $20,000 (approximately EUR 17,200) as a seed grant for all selected municipalities to design and develop their mission-oriented portfolio and begin the testing and implementing activities.
• Opportunity to apply for a growth grant of up to $40,000 (approximately EUR 34, 400) after the implementation and iteration of the mission-oriented portfolio, supporting further development as well as expanded testing and scaling of selected activities.

The selected communities are:

• Armenia: Gavar, Charentsavan
• Republic of Moldova: Zubrești, Anenii Noi
• Ukraine: Zviahel, Kamianets-Podilskyi

Mission-oriented portfolio approach helps communities tackle complex challenges through coordinated sets of interconnected experiments, policies, partnerships, and investments organized around a shared long-term mission rather than isolated projects.

The M4EG Initiative was launched by the European Union in 2017, and it has been continuously funded by the EU since then. Since 2021, the initiative has been managed by UNDP, in close cooperation with the EU, local authorities and various partners.