On Thursday 20 June, the European Commission announced that it had opened an in-depth investigation to determine whether the Flemish Region and its municipalities had granted illegal State aid to three spatial planning organisations involved in nature conservation activities, and information and education on environmental conservation and protection (‘Natuurpunt Beheer’, ‘Limburgs Landschap’ and ‘Vzw Durme’).
The aid was granted for the purchase of land to be converted into nature reserves and for the running costs of visitor centres located in the said reserves.
As a preliminary point, the Commission doubts that the Flemish public aid complies with European rules. It considers that the aid takes the form of subsidies covering up to the entire cost of land acquisition and non-economic educational activities organised in the visitor centres, but also that the associations concerned have carried out secondary activities in the visitor centres (selling wood, running cafeterias, etc.).
In order for these secondary activities not to be considered as economic activities and thus not to be classified as State aid, it would have to be established that they pursue the same interest as the main activities and are in-dissociable from them. (Original version in French by Émilie Vanderhulst)