New measures for the Cohesion Policy

During this pivotal period (end of the year, end of the programming period 2007-2013 and beginning of the new Multiannual Financial Framework 2014-2020), new measures about cohesion policy have been taken.

The cohesion policy, also called EU regional policy is an investment policy and it covers programmes such as the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Social Fund (ESF), INTERREG, the European Globalisation Adjustment Fund, etc. It supports job creation, competitiveness, economic growth, improved quality of life and sustainable development. These investments support the delivery of the Europe 2020 strategy.

Draft amending 2013 budget

The 14th of October, the Permanent Representatives Committee called COREPER agreed on an additional payment needs proposal for the 2013 budget.

Draft amending budget No 8 aims to cover the outstanding payment needs in the areas such as Cohesion policy until the end of the year and is the remaining part of 3.9 billion euro. This amount comes from another Draft amending budget adopted earlier this year.

This political agreement reached by the COREPER has been formally approved by the Council, covering the remaining payment needs of EU budget for 2013. This commitment is in line with the political agreement reached on June 27 between the Presidents of the three EU institutions (Commission, Parliament, and Council) on the 2014–2020 multiannual financial framework.

However, the European Parliament has to take a decision on draft amending budget projects to ensure the use of the Funds.

Compromise on the Cohesion package

Concerning the Multiannual Financial Framework 2014-2020, the COREPER II has approved the final compromise text on Cohesion Policy the 30th of October. This confirmation of the Cohesion policy legislative package could constitute part of the overall agreement.

The compromise resolves last outstanding issues in four areas: macroeconomic conditionalities, performance reserve, co-financing rates and pre-financing levels.

With regard to the macroeconomic conditionalities, although all the main elements of the concept were retained, the compromise clarified the application of the socio-economic such as unemployment rate or poverty rate.  It was also agreed that the European Parliament will be involved in the process of implementation of macro-economic conditionalities through structured dialogue procedure.

Other compromises have been approved such as the reduction of the performance reserve from 7 per cent to 6 per cent and the increase of the co-financing for additional allocations for the outermost regions and Cyprus.

As for the draft amending budget for 2013, this compromise text on Cohesion policy for 2014-2020 has also to be approved by the European Parliament.