The European budgets and economic committees have approved the InvestEU programme, promoting EU investment, for the 2021-27 budget period.
The InvestEU programme, designed to replace the current European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), will mobilise more than €698 billion across the EU in additional investment. The programme will comprise a steering board appointed by the European Parliament, in order to ensure balanced representation of appointees with experience in policy and banking. To maintain the programme’s accountability to the European citizens it was established to benefit, the steering committee will report annually to both the European Parliament and Council of Europe on its progress.
There are three main features of the InvestEU programme:
- The InvestEU fund – using guarantees from the EU budget, the fund will mobilise and incentivise public and private investment;
- The InvestEU advisory hub – providing technical and business advice to projects hoping to solicit investment; and
- The InvestEU portal – a comprehensive database geared towards bringing investors and project designers together.
Roberto Gualtieri, co-rapporteur and Chair of the Committee on Economic and Monetary affairs, said: “Today we adopted a good text that marks a decisive step towards creating jobs and mobilising investments to support growth and enhance cohesion. Investment in sustainable infrastructure, research and innovation is still inadequate; the InvestEU programme can continue and improve the positive change brought about by the European Fund for Strategic Investment. It can help to bring strategic and long-term benefits to key areas that are underfunded and thereby improve the EU’s competitiveness and socio-economic convergence. We made sure that the InvestEU fund would support social infrastructure and programmes, along with projects that are technically and economically viable. The programme should continue to facilitate access to finance for SMEs [small and medium enterprises], the cultural and creative sectors and climate actions.”
The InvestEU programme, created in hopes of addressing the EU’s significant investment gap, brings together a number of previous investment initiatives including the EFSI, funding instruments attached to the Connecting Europe Facility; and aspects of the EU Programme for Employment and Social Innovation.
