Brussels, 12/06/2014 (Agence Europe) - No sooner has the reformed cohesion policy started to be set in place for the programming period 2014-2020 than the Conference of the Peripheral Maritime Regions (CPMR) has begun looking at improvements to be made for the following, post-2020, period.
The association is starting an advanced reflection process on this subject and has already made recommendations for red lines to be respected over the next decade.
The CPMR has advised the European Parliament and the next Commission to extend the territorial criteria of the cohesion policy. The association suggests that the the method for allocating European structural funds take account of the regional competitiveness index, the regional innovation scoreboard and the territorial vision of the ESPON programme, which suggests including the criteria of depopulation, regional economic gaps, isolation and land withdrawal.
The CPMR also stresses that the statistics used to classify the regions should be more up to date. The distribution for the period 2014-2020 is based on pre-crisis statistics, which has skewed some of the results, with adverse effects.
A further reform of cohesion policy should also take greater account of the diversity of lands, but also the unique nature of island regions, the CPRM adds. (MD)