International cooperation

The National Paying Agency‘s (NPA) goals and objectives related to international cooperation, are integral with the general objectives of foreign policy and long-term state development strategy: to promote cooperation in the region and abroad, to become an effective member of the EU, to strengthen worldwide the authority of Lithuania, to spread the values of democracy, tolerance and dialogue.

NPA is actively involved in achieving the above objectives.

Participation in international events:

• EU Paying Agencies Directors’ conferences. Events take place twice a year, in spring and autumn.
• MARS conferences. Annual meetings are designated for specialists responsible for control related to implementation of EU-supported projects, for supervision of implementing undertaken commitments.
• AMADEUS conferences. Annual meetings of the EU Paying Agencies representatives, responsible for internal audit issues. 
• Panta Rhei conferences. Events take place twice a year, in spring and autumn. They are for specialists dealing with information technologies, aiming at further IT development, strengthening information security, adapting to new requirements.
• Baltic-Polish Paying Agencies’ conferences. These are annual events taking place in turn in one of the following countries: Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Poland. Objective of the meetings – sharing good practices, exchanging experience on daily issues of the EU support administration. 
• Learning Network meetings. LN, being a basis for cooperation between EU Paying Agencies’ Directors, with several meetings a year, is a platform for day-to-day networking via website on issues related to simplification of administration processes, reducing work load, introduction of e-services.

Implementation of international projects:

• 2010 EU Twinning Light project "Strengthening the administrative capacity of the Bulgarian Paying Agency for the milk sector to successfully implement the milk quota trading system".
• 2011 Nordic Council funds – Nordic-Baltic Mobility Programme: Strengthening Administrative Capacities of Lithuanian and Nordic Paying Agencies. (Paying Agencies in Sweden and Finland).
• 2012 bilateral project No.2012-VB-MD-0015 between Lithuania and Moldova „Strengthening administrative capacities of the Moldovan Paying Agency – optimisation of institutional activities by reorganisation of regional offices“, funded by the Development Cooperation and Democracy Promotion Programme of the Republic of Lithuania. 
• 2013 bilateral project No. 2013-VB-UA-0019 between Lithuania and Ukraine  “Transfer of Lithuanian experience as to introduction in Ukraine of efficient administrative control system of national support for agriculture and rural development in accordance with the EU requirements“, funded by the Development Cooperation and Democracy Promotion Programme of the Republic of Lithuania. 
• 2013–2015 EU Twinning Project No. MN 11 IB AG 01 “Strengthening Rural Development Programme under IPARD in Montenegro”. 
• 2014 bilateral project No. P2014-VB-UA-0011 between Lithuania and Ukraine “Strengthening capacities in the area of agricultural policy in Ukraine”, funded by the Development Cooperation and Democracy Promotion Programme of the Republic of Lithuania.
• 2015 bilateral project No. P2015-VB-UA-003 between Lithuania and Ukraine “Strengthening capacities in the area of agricultural policy in Ukraine”, funded by the Development Cooperation and Democracy Promotion Programme of the Republic of Lithuania.
• 2016–2017 EC technical assistance project EuropeAid/136256/DH/SER/AZ “Support to E-Agriculture in Azerbaijan: innovative and effective agricultural policy management for higher productivity and competitiveness”.
• 2016–2017 EC Twinning Light Project in Macedonia “Strengthening the capacities of the national authorities for sound and efficient management of EU Funds, as well as in view of the new EU Regulation for the 2014-2020". Project is implemented by the Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Lithuania, Central Project Management Agency and the NPA.
• 2016–2017 EC project SafeNet in accordance with the EC OLAF Hercules III programme.
• 2016–2018 EC programme “Horizon 2020” – project RECAP “PeRsonalised public sErvices in support of the implementation of the CAP“.   
• 2017–2020 ESA (European Space Agency) project Sen4CAP.
• 2018 International IACS Study “Analysis of Administrative Burden Arising from the CAP”, with the participation of 12 EU member states, including Lithuania.
• 2018–2022 EU INTERREG Europe programme – project Agrirenaissance “Innovation-driven agri-food sectors for European industrial renaissance”.
• 2018–2020 EC programme “Horizon 2020” – project EO4AGRI “Bringing together the Knowledge for Better Agriculture Monitoring“.
• 2019–2020 “CAPCON – CAP subsidies control service based on multi-sensor tracking of farming activities”, ESA programme.
• 2019–2020 “Sentinel satellite image processing”, ESA PECS programme.
• 2019–2022 EU CEF funding instrument-supported project No. 2018-EU-IA-0086 Open IACS “Open LOD platform based on HPC capabilities for Integrated Administration of Common Agriculture Policy“. The project is implemented by the NPA from Lithuania, in consortium with Spain, Italy, Greece and Poland. Open IACS project focuses on public open data, with the objective to support the generation, aggregation and cross-border reuse of public open data sets, increase the capabilities of HPC and of the data of the European data infrastructure, and promote the use of HPC and data across borders in the public interest.
• 2019-2022 EC programme “Horizon 2020” – project NIVA “New IACS Vision in Action”.
• 2020-2022 EC programme “Horizon 2020” – project DIONE “An integrated EO-based toolbox for modernising CAP area-based compliance checks and assessing respective environmental impact”. More information here, video about project here.
• 2020-2022 EC programme “Horizon 2020” – project ENVISION ”Monitoring of environmental practices for sustainable agriculture supported by Earth observation“. ENVISION aims to fulfil the need for continuous and systematic monitoring of agricultural land, shifting the focus from fragmented monitoring limited to specific fields and dates (or time windows) to territory-wide and all-year-round monitoring. For more information please visit the ENVISION project website: https://envision-h2020.eu/
• 2020–2027 The EU LIFE programme project “Optimisation of NATURA network in Lithuania“ implemented by the Environmental Projects Management Agency with the involvement of the NPA as of 2020-01-01. The Integrated Nature-related Project is intended for implementation of the Priority Action Framework, a national strategy document for Natura 2000 sites. Project objective: specification of conservation objectives for Natura 2000 network sites at national and individual site level, in accordance with the established favourable criteria of the conservation status for habitats and species of the Community interest.
• 2021–2023 ESA (European Space Agency) project EO-Widget (ESA Incubed EO widget).
• 2021-2024 EC programme Horizon 2020 – project EIFFEL “Revealing the role of GEOSS as the default digital portal for building climate adaptation and mitigation applications”. EIFFEL will exploit the untapped potential of available GEOSS datasets, i.e. satellite, in-situ, modelling, crowdsourced, by creating AI-based cognitive search tools. Added-value services interoperable with GEOSS will be designed, using cognitive search and metadata augmentation tools based on Artificial Intelligence, including Natural Language Processing. More information...
• 2022-2024 EU Twinning project "Strengthening and adaptation of administrative capacities for the introduction of the Organization of Agricultural Markets" SR 18 IPA AG 01 21 in the Republic of Serbia.
• 2025-2027  Interreg Latvia–Lithuania OASIS project

The Interreg Latvia–Lithuania OASIS project aims to make better use of Earth observation data and artificial intelligence to improve agriculture, land monitoring, and public sector services. Key actions include:

• Decreasing errors, penalties, and the need for on-site inspections through more accurate remote monitoring.
• Incorporating an AI-driven on-demand service into the GIS systems of the Paying Agencies in Lithuania and Latvia.
• Releasing open datasets and engaging sectors outside traditional agriculture.

Over its two-year duration, the project will deliver upgraded satellite imagery, updated parcel boundary (delineation) products, and their integration into existing national systems. High-resolution Sentinel-2 imagery (1-metre) will be used to automatically detect and draw parcel boundaries. In parallel to technical improvements, the project will also reduce administrative workloads for both farmers and the respective Paying Agencies.

• 2023-2029 Horizon Europe AgriDataValue project

The Horizon Europe AgriDataValue project focuses on accelerating agriculture’s digital transformation and improving agri-environmental monitoring by developing a decentralized smart-farming data ecosystem. The project’s work includes:

• Harnessing big data to enhance productivity, strengthen environmental performance, and support fair and stable income for farmers.
• Creating tools for area monitoring, sensor-based data collection, and observation of climate and land-use changes (e.g., soil moisture, erosion, crop damage, yield estimations), as well as automated crop and object classification from geotagged images.
• Connecting with, or aligning to existing satellite and remote-sensing infrastructures such as Sentinel, along with other Horizon initiatives.

The project will establish a pan-European, open-source agricultural data space that advances smart farming and environmental monitoring through a novel “platform of platforms.” Key expected outcomes include a fully operational federated platform enabling secure data sharing, new data-driven business models, trustworthy AI solutions using federated machine learning, and extensive pilot trials across nine EU countries to validate the tools in practice. Ultimately, the project will provide farmers with access to a far broader and richer set of data resources, supporting a faster and more seamless shift toward smart agriculture.

• 2023-2026 Horizon Europe BirdWatch project

The Horizon Europe BirdWatch project aims to create a service that evaluates habitat suitability and supports biodiversity by integrating Earth Observation data with species and habitat modelling. Its main activities involve:

• Developing a spatial modelling and monitoring system that brings together remote-sensing inputs, bird observation records, thematic maps, species distribution models (SDMs), and biodiversity metrics.
• Allowing users to assess habitat suitability at the parcel level, determine which eco-schemes (environmental practices) are most effective in enhancing habitats, and estimate the associated economic impacts.
• Delivering these functionalities through an online platform.

BirdWatch serves as a central source of bird data and species distribution models, which feed into biodiversity indicators and spatio-temporal analyses. It is designed to offer practical guidance, such as determining how appropriate a given area is for various bird species, identifying the eco-schemes most likely to improve habitat quality, and evaluating the financial benefits of such measures for farmers.

• 2023-2026 EU LIFE “Green Farm for LIFE” / ESA GTIF / Carbon & GHG Monitoring (Area Monitoring & Carbon Credits System)

  The EU LIFE “Green Farm for LIFE” initiative—together with ESA GTIF and related carbon and GHG monitoring work—aims to design, test, and validate reliable methods for assessing and reporting greenhouse gas (GHG) balances in agriculture, forestry, and other land-use sectors (AFOLU). Key activities include:

  • Creating the foundations for a national carbon-sequestration certification scheme, including the technological infrastructure, carbon registry platform, and mechanisms for data exchange and governance.
  • Working with policymakers and sector stakeholders to update national GHG accounting approaches, regulatory frameworks, incentive structures, and role assignments.

Project tasks cover the development of methodologies, calculation tools, carbon mapping, as well as demonstrations, training sessions, and e-learning resources. The initiative will establish a system for monitoring soil organic carbon stocks, support the rollout of a carbon certification and monitoring framework, and deploy digital tools that help farmers operate more efficiently while contributing to EU climate-neutrality targets.

Within the project, the NPA is contributing to the development of a free carbon-credit platform, designed to simplify farmers’ participation and enable them to earn additional income. By providing access to open-source data, the project encourages broader farmer involvement and facilitates their ability to benefit from carbon credits.

Cooperation with foreign countries

NPA maintains close business relationship with quite a few EU Member States (Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Czech Republic, France, Romania, Slovenia, Finland, and Holland). Cooperation is on-going with the Eastern Partnership countries (Belarus, Moldova), with the EU candidate countries (Montenegro, Albania, Serbia, Turkey). NPA concluded bilateral cooperation agreements with the paying agencies in Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Moldova, Poland. A Trilateral Agreement between the Polish Agency for Restructuring and Modernisation of Agriculture, the Ukrainian State Farmers Support Fund and the NPA was concluded. Cooperation Agreement has been signed with the Agricultural and Rural Development Support Institution (Paying Agency) in Turkey. 

Collaboration comprises study visits, implementation of joint projects, workshops.

Contacts of international relations team:

Blindžių g. 17, LT-08111 Vilnius