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1. The national agency shall:

(a) have legal personality or be part of a legal entity which has legal personality, and be governed by the law of the Member State concerned;

(b) have the adequate management capacity, staff and infrastructure to fulfil its tasks satisfactorily, ensuring efficient and effective management of the Programme and sound financial management of Union funds;

(c) have the operational and legal means to apply the administrative, contractual and financial management rules laid down at Union level;

(d) offer adequate financial guarantees, issued preferably by a public authority, corresponding to the level of Union funds it is called upon to manage.

2. The national agency shall be responsible for managing all stages of the project lifecycle of the actions it manages as set out in work programmes as referred to in Article 22 of this Regulation, in accordance with point (c) of the first subparagraph of Article 62(1) of the Financial Regulation.

3. The national agency shall have the requisite expertise to cover all sectors of the Programme. Where a Member State or third country associated to the Programme has more than one national agency, those national agencies shall collectively have the requisite expertise to cover all sectors of the Programme.

4. The national agency shall issue grant support to beneficiaries within the meaning of point (5) of Article 2 of the Financial Regulation by way of a grant agreement as specified by the Commission for the Programme action concerned.

5. The national agency shall report each year to its national authority and the Commission in accordance with Article 155 of the Financial Regulation. The national agency shall be in charge of implementing the observations issued by the Commission following its analysis of the yearly management declaration and of the independent audit opinion thereon.

6. The national agency shall not, without prior written authorisation from the national authority and the Commission, delegate to a third party any task related to the Programme or budget implementation conferred on it. The national agency shall retain sole responsibility for any tasks delegated to a third party.

7. Where the mandate of a national agency is revoked, that national agency shall remain legally responsible for meeting its contractual obligations vis-à-vis the beneficiaries of the Programme and the Commission pending the transfer of those obligations to a new national agency.

8. The national agency shall be in charge of managing and winding up the financial agreements relating to the 2014-2020 Programme that are still open at the beginning of the Programme.