Simson: Commission's proposal on infrastructure financing encouraging
The proposal of the European Commission to continue financing critical cross-border projects such as Rail Baltica at a rate of 85% in the next EU budget period is very encouraging, Minister of Economic Affairs and Infrastructure Kadri Simson (Centre) said on Thursday.
"The Commission's proposal is a clear signal that their support will continue and we will be able to move forward together with Latvia and Lithuania," Simson said in a press release.
The Estonian minister is to take part in a meeting of EU transport ministers in Luxembourg on Thursday, where one of the central topics on the agenda is the Connecting Europe Facility.
Simson noted that Rail Baltica meets all the criteria set for priority projects of the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) and is therefore very clearly competitive for support in the future as well.
In addition, member states are also to endorse a proposed regulation on safeguarding competition in air transport, a draft directive on port reception facilities for the delivery of waste from ships, as well as draft directives on electronic road tolling and the exchange of information, and on the use of hired vehicles.
As part of the 2021-2027 EU budget, the European Commission on Wednesday proposed to renew the Connecting Europe Facility, with a budget of €42.3 billion to support investments in the European infrastructure networks for transport with €30.6 billion, energy with €8.7 billion, and digital with €3 billion. This represents a 47% increase compared to 2014-2020 when measured in current prices for the EU27 in 2014-2020 versus the EU27 in 2021-2028. The rate of increase is 29% in 2018 constant prices.
Editor: Aili Vahtla
Source: BNS