European Union is facing great challenges in employment and social field and, despite an improvement related to economic perspectives, these problems are still present both due to the unequal situation between EU member states and to pressures of the global economy on the European economy. Successful projects will be rewarded by incentives, thus determining the competitiveness of their correct and concrete implementation.
The drop in the competence and performance level in the active policy on the employment market, educational systems, social exclusion of marginalised groups and the reduced workforce mobility are the main problems faced by the EU. If not dealt with efficiency, they can represent a significant threat to social cohesion and competitiveness.
While serving Europe 2020 Strategy, the European budget for the following 7 years wishes to finance the projects generating smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, by embracing a vision of economic growth and a balanced social progress.
Thus, three out of seven pilot initiatives contain a coherent set of proposals for actions at the European and national level in the employment and social sector. Financing will support the development and the introduction of an active labour market policy, life-long learning, the promotion of the workforce mobility and of systems appropriate for the social security.
Under the circumstances, the main financing instrument is the European Social Fund (ESF) which will provide funds for structural actions on economic, social and territorial cohesion, focusing on the key priorities of the 2020 Strategy: promotion of employment, investments in competencies, education and learning, social inclusion, consolidation of institutional capacity and public administration efficiency measures.
For the period after 2013, ESF will grant funds through a Common Strategic Framework for structural funds and the financing will be planned through Partnership agreements, negotiated with each member state. Project implementation will be simplified, focusing especially on simplified cost options regarding small projects, reducing the administrative task at the state and region levels, by facilitating access to finance for local initiatives. Likewise, incentive mechanisms will be introduced to reward successful programmes which will also determine the adoption of viable measures in the case of the other projects as well.
The minimum weight of investments necessary for the cohesion policy granted by ESF will be adapted to the different categories of regions – 25% for convergence regions, 40% for transition regions and 52% for competitive regions – based on the Cohesion Fund which still represents a third from the cohesion policy fund allocation, territorial cooperation being excluded. Applying these percentages results in a minimum ESF rate of 25% from the budget allocated to the cohesion policy.
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