The European Parliament adopted a
resolution on the absorption of Structural and Cohesion Funds: lessons learnt
for the future cohesion policy of the EU.
Absorption capacity is the extent to
which a Member State and its regions are able to spend the financial
resources allocated from the Structural and Cohesion Funds in an effective
and efficient manner. Parliament recalls that this capacity is necessary for
making a maximum contribution to economic, social and territorial cohesion
with the resources available from the EU funds.
Main problems identified: pointing out that efforts have been made to ensure an
acceleration in absorption capacities and budgetary implementation of
cohesion policy during 2010, Parliament points out that
absorption problems have been caused by the following main factors:
(i) difficulties with completing the compliance assessment procedures
concerning the new management and control system, that generally fall at the
beginning of the programming period; (ii) global economic recession,
which has a direct effect in the form of the budgetary restraint measures
applied to public budgets and difficulties in obtaining internal financing;
(iii) insufficient resources to co-finance projects; (iv) delays in the
establishment and introduction of EU and national rules or related guidance,
and incomplete or unclear rules; (v) delays in the translation of the
guidance notes and in obtaining clarification from the Commission, and
inconsistency of Commission guidance; (vi) over-complicated and over-strict
national procedures, and frequent changes therein.
Improving
absorption capacity: the
resolution presents a certain number of proposals with a view to improving
absorption capacity:
- encourage and maintain an extensive
dialogue with all stakeholders at national, regional and
local level in order better to identify the needs of the labour market;
- improve awareness and accessibility of
the ESF and to update project-building capacities in order to contribute
to the creation of new, decent jobs and more effective social inclusion;
- give priority to the integrated
approach for local and regional development projects, encouraging the
development of bottom-up local initiatives for the ESF and making it
possible to combine several sources of financing: operational
programmes, national programmes and private resources at the individual
project level;
- the ESF objectives to be brought into
line with the real requirements of a labour market that is in need of
investment in upgrading vocational training and in measures to protect
craft trades;
- the need for greater synergy and
complementarity between all the shared management funds (ERDF, ESF,
Cohesion Fund, EAFRD and EFF) and the EDF in the case of certain
European regions which neighbour ACP countries;
- review the level of co-financing to reflect better the level of development, EU added value,
types of action, beneficiaries, their absorption capacities and
development opportunities;
- an adequate Community budget to
be allocated to cohesion policy at a time when national and local
contributions are being hampered by national budgetary austerity
policies;
- pay more attention to project
preparation and to draw up a project pipeline so that the risk of
cost overrun can be minimised and a high absorption rate attained;
- pay attention to better management
of human resources by making further efforts to attract and retain
qualified staff to manage EU funds, by promoting high-quality training
for them, and by avoiding any replacement of staff unless this is
strictly necessary and guided by the sole aim of improving their
effectiveness and consequently the absorption capacity;
- establish an Internet-based platform
for beneficiaries, local and regional stakeholders and government
institutions to exchange best-practices and information on obstacles,
problems and their possible solutions;
- use the information and communication
systems to develop an early warning system on the absorption of the
funds.
Important role of the European Social
Fund (ESF): Parliament considers that the
European Social Fund (ESF) provides vital support for labour market policies
and plays an important role in promoting social inclusion, and whereas its funding
needs to be considerably stepped up. It stresses the need to ensure
that the European Social Fund (ESF) is used more effectively to address
the challenges posed by the current economic financial downturn. It makes the
following recommendations:
- ensure that the ESF is used in a more
efficient way, to respond to the present socio-economic challenges
brought about by the financial recession, at all levels and in all
Member States;
- ensure that the future ESF makes a
meaningful, targeted contribution to the implementation of the Europe
2020 Strategy in the fields of employment and social inclusion as a
visible, transparent, efficient, flexible, simple and user-friendly
instrument that is brought to bear to develop human capital, while
reflecting the specificities and needs of Member States and regions;
- the need to concentrate efforts on a
limited number of priorities – the most urgent among them being reducing
record levels of unemployment in the internal market, with special
reference to jobs for young people and women;
- improve awareness and accessibility of
the ESF and to update project-building capacities in order to contribute
to the creation of new, decent jobs and more effective social inclusion;
- on the basis of clear rules, to use the
possibility of advance payments to ESF beneficiaries to a greater
extent.
Facilitating access of SMEs: Parliament points out that most SMEs, and especially small and
micro enterprises, cannot access Structural Funds on their own due to current
administrative and financial constraints and that they need support and
advice from their representative organisations at regional and national level.
It considers that a simplification of the rules and procedures is
essential to ensuring their access to Structural Funds. Members call for the Small Business Act, its ‘think small
first’ and ‘only once’ principles and the proportionality principle to be
applied at all levels of decision-making to define investment priorities and
the design of management, audit and control procedures in order to ensure
better absorption of the funds.
Lastly, Parliament reiterates that the
mechanisms of multi-level governance and the partnership principle
are key elements in the effectiveness of operational programmes and in high
absorption capacity.