Stock image. (source: Pixabay)
Slovakia has a recovery and resilience plan that many tend to see just as a large package of money to be spent to beautify buildings, buy equipment or new technologies, and plant trees. But this is just a part of what the plan is meant to achieve.
Rather than spending as much money from the EU budget as possible, the purpose of the recovery plan is to change Slovakia for the better in every way, bring the quality of life in the country closer to the most successful countries in the EU, and to prepare it for the future.
Slovakia created its recovery plan, just like all the other EU member states, in response to the worsening economic situation caused by the coronavirus pandemic. As such, it is the largest stimulus package ever provided by the European Union.
The Slovak recovery and resilience plan includes investment and reform measures divided into 18 thematic components. It is worth €6.3 billion in grants, 13 percent of which (€822.7 million) was disbursed to Slovakia in mid October 2021. Slovakia applied for the first payment of €458 million on April 19, 2022. In October 2022, the government said it was filing its second application for a payment from the EU's Recovery and Resilience Plan, this time amounting to €815 million.
The recovery plan is a one-of-a-kind opportunity to mitigate the effects of the pandemic, as well as to transform the Slovak economy, create opportunities and jobs, and build a country that the people of Slovakia want to live in.
Unlike EU structural funds, the recovery plan is a performance tool. The EU will not send money to Slovakia just like that: first we need to make many fundamental reforms related to the vital functions of the state – health, education, justice, effective functioning of the state administration, in digitalisation and in preparation for climate change.
