Boosting the capacity of the EIB Group and national promotional banks

Key points

The EESC:

• calls on the co-legislators to ensure that the total funding implemented by the EIB Group increases, in real terms, in the next multiannual financial framework, and expresses its strong opposition to a reduction;
• urges the Council and EU Member States to give a clear mandate to the EIB Group and, potentially, national promotional banks (NPBs), to position them as an enabling piece of the EU’s financial ecosystem, with an integrated approach to close the funding gap for start-ups and scale-ups, and to fund the strategic autonomy of the EU and the provision of European public goods;
• recommends reinforcing and increasing direct lending for funding strategic infrastructures;
• calls for further initiatives to strengthen institutional cooperation, such as co-investment programmes and platforms, direct participation of NPBs in the design and implementation of the national and regional partnership plans, and also participation of the NPBs in the governance of the European Competitiveness Fund (ECF);
• reminds the obligation to preserve a fair balance in the allocation of risks between the public and private sectors, and respecting the principle of additionality;
• welcomes the European Competitiveness Fund; reiterates the need to distinguish between funding basic research and (pre-) commercial research and development; the focus of Horizon Europe on preserving and promoting excellence in basic research in Europe must not be diluted;
• calls on the co-legislators to consider simplifying the procedural and implementation aspects of EU programmes wherever possible. The instruments targeting SMEs should adopt a digital first approach and only-once principle, standardise templates, self-declaration mechanisms, real-time tracking of application status and a single SME helpdesk per Member State.