Synthesis Report - European Commission - Europa

Ex-post Evaluation of the ERDF 2000-2006
Synthesis Report
1.1.6 A different context in the EU10
This aim applies only to the EU15. The countries which entered the EU in May 2004 had very little
time to alter programmes and in any case were faced by a very different set of circumstances as
regards both economic development and the design and implementation of cohesion policy. In
particular, in most regions, there was a lack of basic infrastructure of adequate standard, posing
a major constraint on sustained development, together with very limited experience of
implementing regional policy, allied to a lack of capacity for doing so. The problems of
development were, therefore, essentially long-term in nature, involving not only infrastructure
deficiencies but also low levels of productivity in most activities and a concentration of
employment in low value-added sectors. The programming period, however, was very short –
initially, the countries had only around 4½ years for funds to be allocated and spent – so that it
was possible only to make a start on programmes which would have a significant effect on
development.
1.1.7 The multiple nature of cohesion policy objectives
The broad objective of policy over the period was to strengthen economic and social cohesion. In
the case of lagging regions receiving funding under Objective 1, the emphasis in the initial
programme documents was, for the most part, on alleviating the constraints on economic
development. In the case of problem regions in the more developed parts of the EU, those
receiving funding under Objective 2, but also some of those receiving funding under Objective 1,
the emphasis was on improving the competitiveness of businesses. These broad objectives were
the same in EU10 countries as in the EU15.
While the main focus in the regions in both sets of countries was an economic one, there were
other aims too, not least a concern to ensure that development was balanced across regions and
that the more peripheral and/or rural ones did not lose out. This was the case not only between
NUTS 2 regions but also within them. It was especially true in countries which were a single NUTS
2 region, such as Denmark, as well as in a number of the EU10 countries which were designated
as Objective 1 regions – the three Baltic States, Slovenia and Malta – but it was also evident in
many other regions. This was the case not only in the larger regions but also in some of the
smaller ones. In Burgenland in Austria, for example, an Objective 1 region with a population of
only around 280,000, an important concern was to stimulate development in the more rural and
less prosperous central and southern part more than in the more favourably placed northern part.
1.1.8 Potential conflicts between objectives
A dilemma was to choose a strategy for deploying the Structural Funds which strengthened the
development potential of the region, or country, as a whole but, at the same time, maintained or
improved territorial balance by achieving a more even spatial distribution of economic activity.
The relative weight attached to these two options tended to determine the allocation of funding –
the extent to which financial resources were concentrated in areas which offered the highest
immediate potential for growth, typically agglomerations (in smaller countries, invariably the
capital city), as opposed to being spread more widely across the region, or even concentrated in
areas where development problems were most acute.
In practice, the decision of how and where to allocate funding is a political one since in some
degree it depends on the importance attached to social cohesion, as well as territorial balance,
and avoiding widening disparities between people living in different areas, as against economic
growth.
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