Brussels, 31/01/2002 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission will be taking part at the presentation in Landshut, in Germany, of a pilot project to support small and medium-sized businesses in EU regions bordering on the countries applying for EU membership. The project, cofunded up to EUR 10 million from the Community budget, has the dual aim of helping SMEs with high labour intensity to face up to the competition of SMEs in candidate countries and that of helping innovative companies to take advantage of these new markets, explains the European Commission. The three directions taken by the programme are: information on the opportunities provided by the markets through Internet sites and workshops, experience sharing between SMEs, and crossborder cooperation networks. The pilot project was developed by an association of chambers of commerce of the Austrian, German, Greek and Italian regions.