The "European Union Programmes and Actions Guide" is an innovative technical support tool, in the form of a multimedia CD-ROM, which gives an overview of all the actions and programmes currently in action by the European Union. It is aimed at companies, regional and local authorities and, not least, the many thousands of potential project promoters who wish to participate in call for proposals and expression of interest launched by the European Commission in the framework of community Programmes and initiatives co-financed by the EU budget.

The Guide, which is being updated every three months so as to reflect changes in EU programmes, is particularly useful because it describes the various mechanisms and procedures involved, while it gives answers to the most frequently posed questions, directs it's readers to other sources of information, enables them to get in touch with the appropriate contact points in their own countries, helps them understand what actions need to be taken to submit a proposal to the EU, whom to contact, when the deadlines are, and what the flow of actions should be.

It is composed of 22 chapters, each specialising in one domain of the EU's actions, such as Agriculture, whereas each description begins with the title of the action/programme/initiative and, where available, the budget line number and the budget amount. The aims or goals of each programme are also summarised in the section on objectives, while readers can find a part concerning eligibility (what kinds of organisations are entitled to apply and under which conditions). Finally, a list of all open calls under each action/programme/initiative is also available.

The 22 chapters are the following ones: