In order to help Member States gear up their economic and social policies to deliver on growth, jobs and public finances, the European Commission has adopted 27 sets of country-specific recommendations, plus one for the euro area as a whole. This should help each country to focus on strategic levers in the next 12 to 18 months, and thus boost EU economy as a whole.

With the adoption of the country-specific recommendations, it marks the penultimate step in the six-month period of intensive economic policy coordination between the EU and Member States labelled the European Semester. The coordination period is done annually and it kicks off in January when the Commission presents its Annual Growth Survey, which sets out the economic policy priorities for the EU for the coming year. In addition, commitments made by the 23 Member States participating in the Euro+ Pact have also been assessed by the Commission as part of this process and are included in its recommendations.

In general, the recommendations are designed to be implemented for the front-loading of measures that will drive forward progress towards the goals contained in the EU's long-term economic strategy, Europe 2020, with its ambitious EU-wide and national targets EU-wide to be achieved by the end of this decade in the areas of jobs, innovation, education, energy and social inclusion. Moreover, the recommendations provide an EU input into national policy-making. Although, Member States remain responsible for designing their economic policies and drawing up their national budgets, there is a broad recognition of our mutual interdependence in the EU in general and in the Euro area in particular. That is why Member States have signed up to the common set of economic priorities for the EU, which Member States are committed to implementing at national level.

Member States have sought to reflect the agreed EU priorities in their programmes and their macroeconomic assumptions are broadly realistic but it is still needed to be more ambitious on fiscal consolidation, while maintaining growth-enhancing measures (research and innovation, business environment, competition in the services sector). On labour markets, more efforts are needed to increase labour-force participation, combat structural unemployment, reduce youth unemployment and early school-leaving and ensure wages reflect productivity.

The European Council on 23-24 June will debate and endorse the recommendations. Their implementation will be monitored over the course of the coming year by the Commission and by Member States through a rigorous and ongoing peer-review process.