Politics

Poland to amend expenditure under EU-funded National Recovery Plan

Photo by Fernando Camino/Cover/Getty Images
Photo by Fernando Camino/Cover/Getty Images
podpis źródła zdjęcia

The Polish government has decided to make changes to 22 of 55 investments under the country’s National Recovery Plan (KPO), funded by the EU’s post-pandemic funds.

Poland is set to receive EUR 25.3 billion in grants and EUR 34.5 billion in loans from EU coffers as part of its National Recovery Plan (KPO), which details how the money will be spent.

But the money had been frozen by the European Commission due to a rule-of-law dispute with Warsaw. The situation changed after a new pro-EU government took over power from the socially-conservative Law and Justice party last December.

PLN 21 billion (EUR 4.9 bn) of the grants is to be used for offshore wind farms, Jan Szyszko, a deputy minister for funds and regional policy, told PAP Business on Friday.

“Today, a draft revision of the National Recovery Plan will be submitted for public consultation,” Szyszko said.

He said that the draft revision covers 22 out of 55 investments, including 14 from the grants part and eight from the loan parts of the KPO.

“Our aim is to invest as much money as possible from the grants part,” Szyszko said. “We look at projects in terms of timeliness and merit.”

“We try to move things around within the KPO so that those projects that have the best chance of being executed are in the grants part, while at the same time reducing the risk of not using the funds, in effect losing them,” he explained.

Asked how much money from the KPO could be lost, he replied that “the aim is to ensure that nothing is lost from the grants part, and to invest what is profitable from the loans part.”

Therefore, some of the riskier projects will be shifted to the loan section, and as part of the KPO revision, the ministry wants to strengthen three flagship investment areas, which include offshore wind farms, for which the ministry wants to allocate PLN 21 billion (EUR 4.9 bln) in grants.

“The construction of Polish offshore wind farms is a flagship project in changing the Polish energy mix. It is a good, safe, feasible project, one that will greatly support Polish business, because it will be built by Polish companies and the installation terminal will be created by Polish engineers,” the deputy minister said.

The changes do not include projects financed under the REPowerEU plan and the rule of law component.

“The public consultations will last a month, and everyone can have their say, although we encourage stakeholders to group together before making comments,” Szyszko said.

The KPO committee is due to meet on April 18, which will be the final stage before the government formally accepts and sends the changes in the KPO plan to the European Commission for approval at the end of April.

The EC has 2 months to decide and the EU Council has another month to make a decision.
Source: 
More In Politics MORE...