In a report published on Thursday 1 July, the European Court of Auditors found that the implementation and monitoring of the European territorial cooperation programmes (Interreg) 2014-2020 still suffered from “weaknesses”, making these programmes “unlikely to unleash the potential of the border regions they covered”.
The auditors acknowledge that the strategies discussed in the cooperation programmes are “clear” and “respond to the challenges faced by the cross-border regions they cover”. However, the report says, it is the downstream process that fails.
In addition, cooperation programmes suffer from a limited budget to really address the full range of cross-border challenges. Thus, the auditors note a tendency to prioritise challenges, with a tendency to focus action on the highest priority challenges.
Furthermore, the Court found that in 14 cases out of the 23 cooperation programmes analysed, there was no clear demarcation between the projects to be co-financed belonging to the cooperation programmes and those belonging to the general programmes, resulting in situations where the same type of operation could be financed from two different sources. The auditors point out, for example, an overlap in eligible areas between Interreg and European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) funding. This may weaken financial concentration.
According to the Court, these shortcomings need to be addressed, especially as the Interreg budget for the current budget period is smaller. Thus, it recommends: - a better concentration of cooperation programmes; - the targeting of financial support to projects on the basis of a meritocratic system based on scores; - finally, the use of indicators to measure the impact of cross-border projects.
To consult the report of the Court of Auditors: https://bit.ly/3hnVE3n (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)