In 2003 the Zakarpattya County Council together with the Szabolcs-Szatmar-Bereg Regional Development Council (Hungary) initiated the TACIS CBC SPF project "Cooperation Bridge 2003". The main role in the project implementation was put on the Ukrainian-Hungarian regional development centre, which has been established as a mirror of the Szabolcs-Szatmar-Bereg regional development agency.

The main tasks and objectives of the Centre are:

• to maintain and develop cross-border cooperation between Ukraine and Hungary;
• to take advantage of those positive tendencies and to solve the broblems which derive from Hungarian accession to European Union;
• to assist the corresponding organizations in cross-border cooperation maitenance and development;
• to initiate and elaborate common cross-border cooperation projects;
• to assist in establishment of an efficient information circulation system.

One of the additional tasks of the Centre is to participate in new generation of regional development experts creation by means of inviting foreign experts, organization of seminars and workshops for local/regional officials, experience exchange, publication of informational guidelines, organization of exhibitions etc. This all is to increase the attention value of the two cross-border regions.