The European Commission confirmed a positive preliminary assessment of Croatia's request for a 700m-euro grant under the Recovery and Resilience Facility.

On Tuesday, the European Commission confirmed a positive preliminary assessment of Croatia's request for a 700m-euro grant under the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF).

On 15 March, Croatia submitted to the Commission a request for payment based on the achievement of 33 important stages and one target value, which were selected for the first installment in the Council Implementing Decision. Outcomes include reforms in health, social policy, adult education, public administration, anti-corruption, fiscal policy, audit and control, anti-money laundering, energy, transport, water and waste management and energy efficiency in buildings, the commission said.

In the request, the Croatian authorities provided detailed and comprehensive evidence that Croatia had achieved a total of 34 key milestones and targets. After a thorough evaluation of this information, the Commission gave a positive preliminary assessment of the Croatian request.

The Croatian Recovery and Resilience Plan includes a wide range of investment and reform measures in six thematic components. Support for the plan will amount to 6.3 billion euros in grants, of which 13 percent (818 million euros) have already been paid to Croatia on September 28, 2021 in the form of pre-financing.

Payments under the Recovery and Resilience Mechanism depend on performance and whether the Member State implements the investments and reforms set out in the Recovery and Resilience Plan.

The Commission is now sending its positive preliminary assessment to the Economic and Financial Committee, which is due to comment on it within four weeks. Once it has received the opinion of the Economic and Financial Committee, the Commission should take it into account in its assessment and make the final payment decision, in accordance with the examination procedure, through the comitology committee. Once the Commission has made that decision, the funds can be paid to Croatia.

Source: HINA / Government of the Republic of Croatia