The government announced on Thursday that it will not ask the European Commission for more loans for the Recovery and Resilience Plan (PRR), the maximum allocation of which should therefore be concluded at EUR 22 200 million.
According to a joint communiqué of the cabinets of the Minister of the Presidency and the Minister of Economy and Marine, “For the purpose of assessing known expressions of interest in strategic investments for the country, the state of maturity and implementation schedules, and Considering the implementation schedule of the PRR until 2026, the government has decided that there will be no addition to the investments and reforms that are already being negotiated with the European Commission.”
Deadline for Member States to apply to the European Commission for new loans under the PRR, in the context of the recovery and resilience mechanism, ended this Thursday, with the possibility that Portugal could ask for the approximately EUR 8,300 million in loans that the country still has outstanding.
This is because of the EUR 14,200 million made available as a loan to Portugal, the government has started to mobilize EUR 2,700 million in 2021, after requesting a further EUR 3,200 million last May in the reprogramming of the PRR.
According to Thursday’s statement, in order to strengthen the attractiveness of investment, the government has chosen to “create a contractual mechanism for strategic investments, examining in particular the current state aid framework integrated into the industrial plan of the Ecological Pact of the European Union.” .
According to him, the mechanism “is still being worked on by the government departments of Economy and Foreign Affairs” and “is designed to respond to expressions of interest, namely in areas such as ‘microchips’, green industry and sustainable mobility, the implementation of which is ongoing. beyond the time horizon of the PRR”.
This initiative, he adds, “will complement the measures in place to encourage projects with a structuring effect, of which the Mobilizing Agendas of the PRR and the RCM [resolução do Conselho de Ministros] 34/2023 are examples”.
On May 25, the government presented the project to reprogram the PRR to Brussels, which provides for an increase of EUR 5,600 million, increasing the maximum allocation for the ‘bazooka’ from EUR 16,600 million to EUR 22,200 million.
The Executive indicates that of this additional amount “approximately EUR 2,400 million relates to grants and EUR 3,200 million to loans whose purpose is to respond to the increase in costs caused by the current economic situation and to support the ambition of already increase measures. , namely in relation to strengthening the Mobilizing Agendas Program”.
With this reprogramming, the Portuguese PRR goes from a total of 115 to 156 measures, from 31 to 43 reforms and from 83 to 113 investments, linked to a total of 501 targets to be met by the first half of 2026, the statement said.
At the end of June, the Minister of the Presidency, Mariana Vieira da Silva, had suggested in the Parliament’s Economic Affairs Committee that the final decision on the use of the total amount of loans would be taken at the end of August.
“We are still exploring the use of the global loan amount […]. We will make that decision at the end of August,” Mariana Vieira da Silva said at the time.
According to the minister, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was tasked with identifying investments that could be attracted to the country.
The implementation of the PRR continues at 17% of the milestones and targets agreed with the European Union (EU).
Source: DN
