EUConsult Information Service
2007 November
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News / Resources
Europe News/Resources
- Transparency for Europe's civil society through online reporting
A GuideStar system provides an online, highly searchable catalogue of reports on a country's civil society organisations (CSOs). Organisations have a free venue to communicate their work effectively and easily to national and international audiences. The GuideStar Europe project will assess the feasibility of implementing GuideStar systems for 4 European countries (Germany, Hungary, Ireland and the Netherlands) as well as a pilot European portal site. Over the course of 18 months (April 2007- September 2008), each national partner will:
- Determine if a GuideStar system is appropriate and workable in each country
- Gather requirements for and test the feasibility of a standardised service that will provide information on CSOs at individual country sites and the entire region through the GuideStar Europe portal.
The project is co-funded by the European Commission under its eTEN programme and in several cases by governmental, private sector and philanthropy sources in partner countries.
GuideStar Europe / European Portal
- Comparison of legal and fiscal regulations across the EU
The European Foundation Centre (EFC) has developed comprehensive charts that allow a comparison of legal and fiscal regulations and practices across the countries of the EU. These charts act as a benchmarking tool of good legal and fiscal provisions and practices at the national level, which can have an impact on those countries revisiting their foundation and tax laws. The EFC has also drawn up a user-friendly comparative chart of the tax treatment of donations to public benefit foundations in EU countries. This useful tool allows concrete comparisons of in-kind and cash donations of different amounts (from 1,000 to 100,000 euros) by corporate and individual donors. “Comparative Highlights of Foundation Laws” can be downloaded from the EFC website.
