The countries of the European Union and the European Parliament reached an agreement this Saturday for a 2025 budget amounting to 192,768.6 million euros in commitments, or 1.78% more than the 2024 accounts, with funds to help countries facing natural disasterslike Spain. The agreement also provides for payments of 149,615.7 million euros, the EU Council reported in a statement. €800.5 million was kept available this year within the spending limits of the current multiannual financial framework for 2021-2027, allowing the EU to react to unforeseeable needs, the Council added.
Including this figure for special instruments outside the multiannual financial framework, the EU budget for 2025 amounts to €199,438.4 million in total commitments and €155,209.3 million euros in total payments. As part of next year’s budget, negotiators agreed to advance payment credits worth up to 3 billion euros to support European regions hit by natural disasters. Thus, once the legal basis is confirmed, Member States will be able to use up to 10% of existing cohesion policy funds. to prevent and recover from such disastersprovided that they present a modified program to the Commission, noted the European Parliament in another press release.
The European Commission proposed in July a budget for 2025 providing 199.7 billion euros in commitments (the resources that can be allocated to programs), equivalent to 1.08% of the EU’s gross national income, and 152.7 billion euros in payments (the money actually disbursed). Member States proposed in September reduce these figures by 1.520 million euros and 876 millionrespectively, while the European Parliament demanded to increase the overall level of commitments to 201 billion euros and payments to 153.3 billion, above the Brussels proposal.
The European Parliament has complained that the maximum limits remain very low and expressed concern about “extra costs” of interest from the Next Generation recovery fundwhich amount to around 2.6 billion euros, “double” the Commission’s initial forecasts. The Council, for its part, called for focusing on major Community priorities when distributing funds, criticized the excessive use of the flexibility instrument – intended to deal with unforeseen events – and insisted on the need not to increase the burden on member states at a time when many have little budgetary margin, according to Hungarian State Secretary for Finance Peter Banai, whose country holds the Council presidency.
Spain, against the reduction of the FGA
Spain expressed during the debate between countries on Friday morning its rejection of the budgetary reduction of the Agricultural Guarantee Fundwhich provides direct aid to farmers, while supporting an increase in the allocation of Horizon Europe, Erasmus Plus and funds for the management of the external borders of the EU’s southern neighborhood and sub-Saharan Africa. Finally, the budget agreed this Saturday is “balanced” and “prudent,” leaving “sufficient financial room to respond to unforeseen circumstances,” Banai said.
And he added that “This is a realistic approach that takes into account the current economic and geopolitical context. and the need to face the new challenges that could arise in 2025″ and “provides the financing necessary for the reconstruction of countries affected by natural disasters”. The president of the budget committee, the Belgian Johan Van Overtveldt, one negotiators from the European Parliament, stressed that the pact “demonstrates the EU’s ability to act and adapt in times of uncertainty”, such as the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East, pressures migration, natural disasters or pressures on economic competitiveness.
The 2025 budget is the first prepared after the revision of the 2021-2027 multiannual financial framework, which It was updated last February to include 50 billion euros in aid for Ukraine and strengthen certain priority points. The revision amounted to 64.6 billion euros (discounting loans to kyiv) and created a “cascade” system to pay extraordinary interest on the recovery fund debt (estimated at around 15 billion for the period). The European Parliament and the Council now have fourteen days to formally approve the agreement reached. It is expected to be approved by the Council on November 25 and voted on by the Parliament during its plenary session scheduled for November 27 in Strasbourg, France.
