Ministry of Regional Development (MRD)

Which EU-15 countries benefit from the Cohesion Policy implemented in the Visegrad Group (V4) countries?

A commission by Polish Ministry of Regional Development (MRD) conducted an analysis and the research shows, that benefits resulting from an increase in exports from the EU-15 countries to the V4 countries, significantly reduce the financing costs of the Cohesion Policy implementation in the latter countries for the countries of the ‘old’ EU.

The Cohesion Policy was created to ensure economic, social and spatial cohesion of our continent.

Direct benefits

For the EU-15 countries these are related to the participation in projects implemented on the V4 territory, e.g. through winning tenders or sales of goods. The direct benefits amount to 8.64 billion EURO (11% of all benefits) and are predominated by two categories of tasks:

• provision of construction services;
• supply of medium and high technology products.

It is estimated that construction services in the 2004-2015 period will account for approx. 44% of all funds, with a further 44% of this envelope will fall to high and medium-high technology products.

Indirect benefits

The definite majority of benefits of the EU-15 results from indirect impact through economic development of the V4 countries. The indirect benefits amount to 66.05 billion EURO. Consequently, increased demand can result in intensified trade (exports) between the EU-15 and V4 countries, in certain sectors of the economy thereby causing their faster development.
Each net EURO invested in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia or Hungary generates 61 cents in the form of additional exports to the countries of the ‘old’ EU (EU-15). The overall value of their benefits will amount to 74.69 billion EURO in the 2004-2015 period.