Spain | NGEU funds, we welcome you with open arms

More than a year and a half after the implementation of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR), the excitement is turning into disappointment, as there is a perception that the funds are failing to reach households and businesses.

Key points

• Key points:
• Part of the disappointment stems from the lack of clear and easily accessible reporting on the progress of investments. It’s incomplete, fails to follow criteria for inter-temporal comparability and doesn’t allow monitoring of each of the planned programs and investments.
• During 2021, the Central Government approved expenditures programs linked to the Plan in the amount of €22.13 billion (91% of the total planned). Throughout 2022 and up to November, the Government approved expenditures equivalent to 80% of the amount planned for that year (€22.9 billion).
• Over the two years, the pace of program implementation by the Central Government has been gaining traction and now represents 85% of the total planned for the two-year period.
• An analysis of call of tenders (works, supplies, purchases, etc. contracts) shows that the pace of official tenders financed by the Recovery and Resilience Mechanism (RRM) seems to have slowed in the last few months of last year, while the trend in the award of contracts seems to have accelerated.
• Another part of the disappointment springs from the management of expectations. While the proposed reforms (with some exceptions, such as pensions, which have not been finalized) have proceeded apace, three years after the announcement of the RRM in Europe investments are taking longer than expected.

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