This study explores the professional needs of the Members of the Parliament (MPs) having the purpose to assist the Parliamentary leadership and the donor organizations to plan relevant activities, save up resources and direct their forces to meet MPs’ professional needs.

Driven by the nature of the research, a questionnaire survey was employed. The questionnaire was adapted from the version that was used in Georgia by IABP in assessing the professional needs of Georgian MPs. The adapted questionnaire was then tested for validity with several Moldovan MPs and representatives of the donor community IABP-Moldova cooperates with.

The questionnaire was sent to 95 MPs, excluding those who took part in the validation of the questionnaire (there are 101 MPs in total); the response rate is 34%. As this is an observational and descriptive study, descriptive statistics were used to describe the basic features of the data. The study focused on six professional needs oriented dimensions. These are the needs to enhance i) the knowledge base capacity; ii) decision-making capacity; iii) professional skills; iv) parliamentary oversight; v) transparency of the Parliament; and vi) public perception of the Parliament. MPs had also the opportunity to openly reflect on the existing barriers that hinder the efficient fulfillment of their parliamentary duties.

The second edition of the Coordinating Council took place this year in March (Figure 1). The agenda for this meeting was to I) present IABP-Moldova activities for 2006, which included MPs experience in the programmes; II) discuss the results of the survey on identifying professional needs of MP, including the emerged possible programmes; III) present already planned activities for 2007; and IV) finalise the Action Plan for 2007-2008. New member MPs and new observers were welcomed to the Coordinating Council, as well as the representatives from the Council of Europe as special guests (please visit our website www.iabp-moldova.org for the new composition of the Coordinating Council). The meeting opened with two welcoming speeches - from the Speaker of the Parliament, HE Marian Lupu and the Secretary General of IABP, Mr Fredrick Hyde-Chambers OBE. The presentation of Dr Romeo V. Turcan, IABP-Moldova Executive
Director, could be found on www.iabp-moldova.org.

MPs had a chance to refl ect on their last year experience and provide comments and suggestions on how to enhance IABP-Moldova support to MPs. For example, MPs would like to learn more fro their European counterparts about i) the oversight functions of the Parliament, ii) the regulation of outside business interests and confl ict of interests, and iii) the training programmes that would boost their professional development. The IABP-Moldova annual report is available on www.iabp-moldova.org.

At the meeting, Dr Romeo V. Turcan awarded Mr Conrad Fritsch, the Country Director of CNFA the IABP certificate to acknowledge his contribution to the process of strengthening the IABP national mechanism in Moldova, promoting a transparent and sincere dialogue between the Parliament and business community, as well as his active participation to the programmes organised by IABP-Moldova.