Brussels, 16 June 2023
The Council today adopted an amending implementing decision as regards the recovery and resilience plan of Estonia.
Estonia’s plan is now the first national plan which includes a REPowerEU chapter. This will contribute to accelerating Estonia’s transition towards clean energy, diversifying its energy supplies and improving its energy efficiency.
Additional amendments were made to reflect the updated maximum financial contribution which the European Commission published on 30 June 2022 to take into account changes in real gross domestic product (GDP) over time. It now also reflects changes in some of the projects since Estonia’s plan was first approved in October 2021 and which are due to objective circumstances.
According to the Commission, this modification put forward by Estonia does not affect the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and coherence of the Estonian recovery and resilience plan.
During 2023, it is expected that gradually each of the 27 member states will request implementing decisions concerning amendments to their national recovery and resilience plans at least once, to access the new REPowerEU grants, to request available loans, or to take into account the updated RRF allocation.
Background
The Recovery and Resilience Facility is the EU’s programme of large-scale financial support in response to the challenges the pandemic has posed to the European economy. The facility’s €744 billion (in current prices) are used to support the reforms and investments set out in the member states’ recovery and resilience plans.
Article 11(2) of the RRF regulation says that the maximum financial contribution for non-repayable financial support of each member state shall be updated by the Commission by 30 June 2022 on the basis of Eurostat outturn data on the change in real GDP growth over 2020 and the aggregate change in real GDP for the period 2020-2021. As a consequence, the maximum financial contribution for Estonia decreased from €969 million to €863 million.
On 9 March 2023, Estonia submitted a modified national RRP including a REPowerEU chapter to the Commission amounting to €83.4 million in grants. The modified RRP also takes into account the updated maximum financial contribution and includes a reasoned request to the Commission to amend the Council Implementing Decision of October 2021 considering the RRP to be partially no longer achievable due to objective circumstances such as high inflation, increases in cost since 2021 and supply chain disruptions. Estonia also requested to transfer €6.6 million from the Brexit adjustment reserve, making the modified plan worth €953 million.
Under the new plan, the measures supporting climate objectives account for an amount which represents 59,4% of the RRP’s total allocation whereas the measures supporting digital objectives account for 24,1%.
- Council implementing decision amending the recovery and resilience plan for Estonia
- RRF – note by the Commission services on update of the maximum financial contribution of 30 June 2022
- Recovery fund: ministers welcome assessment of Estonia’s, Finland’s and Romania’s plans (press release, 28 October 2021)
- A recovery plan for Europe (background information)
Source – EU Council