The agricultural and rural development policy is especially of multi-dimensionalimportance for Albania, given that agriculture contributes around 20% of the country's GDP and it employs nearly half of the country´s workforce. Furthermore, the economic and financial opportunities that EU provides through accessing of the single market and the instruments ofCommon Agricultural Policy (CAP) are additional incentives to progress towards EU integration. Nevertheless, by just formally aligning the legal and policy frameworkwith EU requirements may not be sufficient to access the benefits of the single market and of CAP´s different financial instruments.Albania, itself, needs to prepare a viable farming sector that is able to withstandcompetitive pressures in the single market after joining the EU and that can promote rural development and converge with EU standards related to food security and natural resources management. This means that policy, structural and market reforms should be guided by the contextual features of the country´s agricultural sector and capacities to implement them in the field. These issues will be discussedin more detail in the subsequent policy papers. The first paper Albanian agricultural policy development and compliance with EU Common Agriculture Policypresents a synthesis of the policy strategic documents in the recent decade and the key developments in in supporting agriculturein Albania, including assessment of gaps in the policy implementation and the one stated at the strategic documents. The paperprovides recommendations on policy improvements to assess their compliance with the EU accession requirements. Albania has been making efforts to reform its agriculture and rural development policy in the framework of the European integration process and its commitment to follow the Agenda 2030. Since 2014, when its candidate status was awarded, the agriculture and rural development policy has undergone continuous adjustments in terms of institutional and policy compliance with EU Common Agriculture Policy. One key challenge that the agricultural sector faces related to environmental consequencesand that should be properly addressed is water management, which is also the focus of the third paper, Albania´s challenges to implementation of EU´s Water Framework Directive.Currently, the watergovernance in Albania is highly fragmented with little convergence across the sectors. Also, investment decisions related to water are often made on the basis of single sector considerations and with almost no participation from main actors.