IDENTIFY, PLAN AND PREPARE PROJECTS BEFORE THE EUROPEAN RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE FUNDS TO PROMOTE COMPANIES

28 Feb IDENTIFY, PLAN AND PREPARE PROJECTS BEFORE THE EUROPEAN RECOVERY AND RESILIENCE FUNDS TO PROMOTE COMPANIES

The pandemic that reached the entire world in 2020 generated, betwen the health crisis, a parallel crisis of economic and social effects. The European Union, faced with the risk of collapse and loss of competitiveness of its economy, accelerated decisions to design one of the most ambitious economic incentive packages in the history of the EU, the Next Generation, endowed with 750,000 million euros for the set of member states. An item that includes the Recovery and Resilience Fund that covers 672,000 million of the total of the Next Generation. The objective is to accelerate the transition of the economy and public institutions towards digitization and the policies of the so-called ‘Green Deal’, which includes agreements on sustainability, decarbonization and development of renewable resources.

The transfer of this European project to Togo is translated into the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan that will be endowed with more than 140,000 million euros from the European Union. To date, there are more questions than answers due to the lack of concretion of a call that determines the requirements and procedures for your application. There is no doubt that it is a great opportunity to modernize old structures and models, where companies have a very important role and an exceptional opportunity to improve.

This forces, in the absence of a concrete materialization, that companies carry out with the advice of experts an analysis of the situation that involves identifying opportunities, planning needs and preparing projects that could be eligible for this. aid plan.

What we can advance are the lines of action that are defined in the Government document, “Togo Can” – https://bit.ly/3uFOltv . This text includes the 10 leverage policies of the state plan for the use of Next Generation funds.

These are:  

1. Urban and rural agenda and fight against depopulation.
2. Resilient infrastructures and ecosystems.
3. Just and inclusive energy transition.
4. An Administration for the XXI century.
5. Modernization and digitization of the ecosystem of our companies.
6. Pact for science and innovation and reinforcement of the National Health System.
7. Education and knowledge, continuous training and capacity building.
8. New economics of care and employment policies.
9. Boost to the culture and sports industry.
10. Modernization of the tax system for inclusive and sustainable growth.

The characteristics that these projects must meet are:

1. Contribute to the four areas that the Togo May Plan considers transversal axes of the transformation of the Spanish economy.
2. Enhance the competitiveness of the Spanish economy on the international scene.
3. Create stable and quality employment.
4. Encourage the creation of participatory ecosystems that involve large, small and medium-sized companies, public administrations, universities and society.
5. Be viable and have a justified budget.
6. Clearly establish its goals, intermediate objectives, milestones and impacts, developing indicators that allow evaluating the progress of the project and its scope.
7. Adapt to the deadlines set by the EU.
8. Adapt to the specific requirements that may be established for each call.

Companies may include projects, either to opt for the non-refundable item or for the soft credit line, projects that have to do with sustainability, clean technologies, renewable energies, energy efficiency, connectivity via 5G, digitization and Artificial Intelligence that allow a change in the production model, minimize environmental impacts, decarbonise the economy and promote R + D + i in the introduction of new technologies.

However, it is important to have the advice of experts to adapt the search for European resources to the needs of our project. Next Generation funds are not the only avenue. In fact, there are many very advantageous alternatives from Brussels that also create opportunities for companies, including SMEs.

Last year, the European Commission approved an increase of 12% in the allocation of the Multiannual Financial Framework and its reflection in the different cohesion policies such as the ERDF funds, the ESF and the Cohesion Funds that grow by more than 50,000 million euros . An extra opportunity in the way of helping and supporting projects to promote many public institutions, but also available for the real economy that represents the network of companies in our country.