Due to finance constraints, Regions are facing increasing problems to meet the requirements to get the most from EU funding. For that reason, the Commission has put forward a set of new measures aimed at simplifying management rules for the structural and cohesion funds. The changes should help to facilitate access to the funds and accelerate flows of investment at a time when public budgets are under pressure.

One major impact of the crisis is that Member States and regions are finding it difficult to provide the additional funding required 'to match' European investments. In response, the changes announced are intended to overcome this challenge to accelerate implementation of the programmes and simplify day-to-day management.

This measures were proposed by the Commission in July 2009, were then discussed by the European Parliament and adopted by the Member States in the Council on 3 June 2010. The modifications enter into force on 25 June 2010.

As part of the measures to counter the economic crisis, additional advance payments totalling 775  M€ will be paid out to some member countries to tackle immediate cash flow problems. Through cohesion policy's three funds (the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Social Fund (ESF) and the Cohesion Fund) are investing a total of 347 billion € between 2007 and 2013 in all EU regions in the 455 cohesion policy programmes.

Funding simplification measures

• Introducing a single ceiling of 50 M€ across the board for all types of major projects that require the Commission's approval: the new uniform threshold will allow smaller-scale environmental projects to be approved by Member States alone, which will help them to start up more quickly.
• Allowing major projects to be financed by more than one programme: e.g. the construction of a major motorway section which cuts across different regions can now be co-financed by several regional programmes. Under previous rules, this could not be accommodated.
• Simpler procedure for revision of programmes to adapt more quickly to the current challenges
• Enhancing the use of financial engineering: possibility of setting up loan schemes to boost spending on energy efficiency and renewable energies in housing
• Easing the obligation to maintain investments: these rules will now only apply to projects where appropriate such as infrastructure and productive investment sectors. They will not apply to undertakings which go unintentionally bankrupt. For ESF-type operations this is also aligned with state aid rules.
• Simplifying the rules on 'revenue-generating' projects (e.g. toll motorways or projects involving the leasing or sale of land): in order to reduce the administrative burden on Member States, revenues will now only be monitored until the closure of the related programme.
• Targeting additional advances of 775 M€ (4% from the ESF and 2% from the Cohesion Fund) for Member States which received a loan under the IMF balance of payment scheme, or saw a GDP decrease of more than 10%: by applying these two criteria, this concerns Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary and Romania.
• Postponing 'N+2 decommitment' rules: under N+2 if the funding allocated in 2007 has not been spent by the end of 2009 it would be automatically returned to the EU budget. The changes will allow the commitments for 2007 to be spent over a longer period. This will avoid the loss of around 220 M€ (125 M€ for Spain, 56 M€ for Italy,  9 M€ for the UK, 6 M€ for Germany, 4 M€ for the Netherlands and 20 M€ for cooperation projects between several countries)

These modifications complement the large number of other initiatives which have been taken since the beginning of the crisis under the European Economic Recovery Plan.