Synthesis Report - European Commission - Europa

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Synthesis Report Ex-post Evaluation of the ERDF 2000-2006 It is difficult to capture the multiplicity of aspects which contribute to well-being, but it is possible to measure one major dimension at least, which is the income per head of people living in different regions. Since cohesion policy is concerned with social disparities as well as economic ones and with maintaining and strengthening social cohesion, it is important to consider disparities in income levels between regions and how they changed over the programming period. A key question, therefore, is how far the reduction in regional disparities in GDP per head noted above was accompanied by a similar reduction in disposable household income per head. Unfortunately the data available at EU-level to investigate this question are not entirely satisfactory 17 . The figures presented in Table 2.6, therefore, should be regarded as indicative only and illustrative of the differences which exist between the series being compared. Moreover, it should be emphasised that the figures for disposable income per head do not take account of differences in the access of households to various services and amenities which are paid for out of taxes, such as childcare facilities as well as education, healthcare and so on. Such access tends to be much more similar across regions within countries, because they tend to share the same social protection systems and institutional arrangements, than across countries. Consequently, the figures in Table 2.6 are indicative of the changes in regional disparities in income per head, broadly defined, which occurred over the period but less so of the changes which occurred across the EU as a whole. Leaving the uncertainty aside, the data suggest that there was indeed a parallel narrowing of disparities in income per head across regions in the EU15 between 2000 and 2006 in line with the reduction in disparities in GDP per head. It also suggests that there was equally a narrowing of disparities in household income per head in the EU10 countries over the period in contrast to the widening in terms of GDP per head. 2.3.5 Other aspects of well-being and territorial cohesion While data on income per head give some insight into how one major aspect of social disparities changed between regions over the programming period, as noted above, they give only a partial insight. To obtain a fuller picture, there is a need to take account of other aspects of well being and living standards which are more difficult both to identify indicators for and to find the data required to attach values to these indicators. One important aspect in this regard, as also noted above, is access to public goods and services, which governments across the EU have sought to make more equal between regions over the period and, indeed, have used financing from the Structural Funds for this purpose (as described in Chapter 4 below). No data exist, however, on the availability of various types of public good or on social benefits in kind (such as child or elderly care services) which could be used in order either to judge the achievements in this respect or to gauge the extent of regional disparities which exists in different countries 18 . 17 Although Eurostat compiles and publishes data on disposable household income per head for NUTS 2 regions, the fluctuations from year to year in the figures suggests that they are subject to a relatively high degree of uncertainty. This applies especially to changes over time. 18 There are data on government expenditure on goods and services of various kinds as well as on expenditure n social benefits in kind, but these exist only at the national level and, moreover, in the case of public goods, do not reflect the past investment which has been made in providing amenities of various kinds. 62
Ex-post Evaluation of the ERDF 2000-2006 Synthesis Report Other, less tangible, aspects are even more difficult to find indicators for, such as the natural or physical environment or the quality of life which people living in different places enjoy, which were aspects that cohesion policy was aimed at evening up over the period. Measurement problems, however, should not mean that aspects of this kind are ignored when judging the performance of cohesion policy, even if they can only be taken into account in qualitative rather than quantitative terms. The same applies to territorial cohesion which is equally difficult to find indicators for, though those used to assess social cohesion might also be relevant.. Since improving the territorial balance of development was an important aim of policy in many cases across the EU, the outcome in this regard also needs to be assessed in qualitative terms. Both social cohesion and territorial balance are also relevant for assessing the sustainability of development which is a key objective of cohesion policy, since in the absence of the two, development is unlikely to be sustainable for any length of time. Equally, of course, sustainability implies that development is not at the expense of environmental damage, increased emissions, the loss of natural assets and the depletion of exhaustible resources. Indicators of these are just as important in assessing how far this objective is being achieved. As for the other aspects, they largely remain to be developed. 2.4 MAIN POINTS TO EMERGE The main points to arise from the analysis of regional developments over the programming period are: • Growth of national economies which formed the context in which regional development in the EU15 took place over the period varied markedly; in particular, it was relatively high and, accordingly, favourable to development, in Greece and Spain, as well as Finland, Sweden and the UK, and relatively low, and less favourable in Germany, Italy and Portugal. • The restrictive nature of budgetary policy was reflected in a significant reduction in public investment in Portugal over the period; in Germany, Austria, Belgium, and Italy, policy restriction meant that public investment was relatively low over most of the period. In Greece, public investment was expanded markedly up until the Games in 2004 and was then reduced. • The continuing process of globalisation reinforced by EU enlargement led to increasing competitive pressure on producers in traditional industries in the EU15 as well as those specialising in labour-intensive activities more generally; many of these were located in lagging regions and others receiving funding under cohesion policy. Accordingly, growth in these regions might be expected to have been less than elsewhere over the period other things being equal. • Growth of GDP per head over the period 2000-2006 was higher on average in Objective 1 regions in the EU15 than in non-assisted regions. This was also the case in all EU15 Member States, with the sole exception of Hainaut in Belgium. In the EU10 countries, the already high growth rates increased further after accession. • Growth of GDP per head in regions receiving significant amounts of funding under Objective 2 was also slightly higher on average than in non-assisted regions over the period. 63
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