On 19 November, the European Parliament approved the Cohesion Policy Package for 2014-2020. Under the EU’s 2014-2020 budget, Cohesion Policy will invest €325 billion in Europe’s Member States, regions and cities. The legislative package for the future Cohesion policy 2014-2020 was approved in first reading by the European Parliament in the plenary session .
It will now be passed to the Council for final adoption.
Key points of the Final Regulation Compromise:
- Encouraging the increased use of financial instruments
- Raising pre-financing rates ( from 2.5% in 2014-16 to 3% in 2020-23)
- Raising co-financing rates (from 50% to 85% for the outermost regions and Cyprus)
- Limiting the performance reserve (to 6% instead of 7%).
- Fixing clear, transparent, measurable aims and targets (for accountability and results and focus on objective)
- Introducing conditions before funds can be channeled
- Simplifying the use of EU investments( with a common set of rules for all European Structural and Investment Funds)
- Enhancing the Urban Dimension of the policy (by earmarking a minimum amount of resources under the ERDF to be spent for integrated projects in cities – on top of other spending in urban areas)
- Reinforcing cooperation across borders and making the setting up of more cross-border projects easier.
- For all Regions, Adapting the level of support and the national contribution (co-financing rate) to their levels of development:
- Establishing a Common Strategy
Final Regulation adopted by EP is available here
For more information: