In the preparatory period, the EU provides assistance to candidate countries from the so-called pre-accession funds, in particular PHARE, ISPA and SAPARD. Following accession to the EU, Slovakia will participate in EU structural funds and the Cohesion Fund. The key structural fund, from which assistance is provided to EU regions that lag behind (regions with GDP lower than 75% of EU average) is the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). An important principle for the operation of this fund is the principle of additionality (co-financing), which means that assistance from the ERDF is only an additional resource to the resources of national governments for the financing of a given project. Another structural fund is the European Social Fund (ESF), from which assistance can be obtained for the development of human resources, especially initiatives related to training and education. The European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund (EAGGF), which helps implement the common agricultural policy, also plays an important role in the system of structural funds.

This fund has a guarantee section (as much as 95% of expenditure related to market regulation) and guidance section (5% of expenditure to support active structural changes in agriculture). The Financial Instrument for Fisheries Guidance (FIFG) helps restructure the EU fishery industry. In a narrower sense, we should add the Cohesion Fund (CF) to the above four structural funds. This fund serves to mitigate the economic differences between individual member states and was designed for Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Greece, whose per capita GDP at the time this fund was established was lower than 90% of the EU average. Funding for large projects in the field of transport infrastructure and infrastructure promoting the quality of the environment can be acquired from this fund. The following three factors are the criteria for the distribution of resources from the Cohesion Fund: size of population, GDP per capita and the land area of a given country. EU directives specify 3 basic goals, which should guide the provision of assistance from structural funds in 2000-2006. Objective 1: The development and structural adjustment of regions whose development is lagging behind

Objective 2: The development of regions in economic and social conversion difficulties
Objective 3: The development of human resources. Structural funds will not become a source of funding for Slovakia until accession to the EU. The total amount of pre-accession assistance for Slovakia in 2001-2004 could reach €414-614 million, which is SKK 18-27 billion. Based on the signed Financing Memoranda, which also include funds from the previous years, Slovakia should acquire SKK 9.4 billion from EU pre-accession funds in 2002 alone. Co-financing in 2002 would require the allocation of SKK 4.8 billion from state budget expenditure. Following accession to the EU, Slovakia will make use of the resources from EU structural funds and the Cohesion Fund. These receipts should not exceed 4% of GDP. The experience from other countries shows that Slovakia's capacity to absorb transfers from the EU will increase only gradually. The study estimates that in the 2004-2008 period Slovakia could realistically absorb funding from EU structural funds amounting to approx. SKK 12-18 billion annually (€0.3-0.4 billion), i.e. approx. 1.1% of GDP. This would require that in the above period Slovakia annually allocate around SKK 15-20 billion in the state budget to co-finance the relevant projects.