AFP - Croatia is to invest almost 550 million euros (822 million dollars) in adjustments needed to join the European Union, that Zagreb hopes will occur in 2011, Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor said Saturday.

In 2010 budget "we have allocated two billion kunas (273 million euros, 408 million dollars) for activities and projects linked with Croatia's adjustment to EU" standards, Kosor told journalists.

"In 2011 we will give 1.9 billion kunas" for the same purpose, she added.

One quarter of the amount planned for the next year will be for the agricultural sector, and some 32 million euros will be spent on bringing security on Croatia's borders with non-EU countries in line with Schengen requirements, she said.

The 25-nation Schengen zone eliminates border identity controls for travel among the member states on the European continent.

Croatia resumed its EU membership talks in October after Slovenia ended a 10-month block of the negotiations over a border dispute between the two countries.

Zagreb, which began talks to join the EU in October 2005, has opened 28 of the mandatory 35 policy negotiating chapters required for membership.