The NRP measures will serve the common good; infrastructure financed under the NRP will contribute to development of the better world

– said President Andrzej Duda at the joint press conference with the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.

Thank you with all my heart. You have welcomed more than 3.5 million of the Ukrainian refugees with open arms. The history shall never forget your solidarity. It is a great example for the entire world

– said the President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen during the press conference on the endorsement of the Poland’s National Recovery Plan.

She added:

After a thorough examination, the European Commission gave green light for the Polish NRP.

The EC President emphasized that the Polish plan allocates, among others EUR 5 billion for development of renewable energy and EUR 7.5 billion for electromobility. According to her, approx. 43 percent of the Polish plan supports the EU climate objectives.

Poland has always opted for highly ambitious Europe. Ambitious Europe and the European Union must feature also the ambitious budget. The budget that enables implementation of the projects of strategic importance such as – unquestionably - the energy and climate transformation. It is therefore good that following the post-pandemic recovery we have agreed a great programme named the NextGeneration UE or the National Recovery Plan. This is a budget, which will support both development of Poland and Europe as a whole. Poland, with its strong and stable economic growth, has become one of the Europe’s driving forces and one of its main engines. It is enough just to look at our economic growth and sustainable macroeconomic and public finance parameters

– emphasized Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.

Closing the negotiations on the National Recovery Plan is a success. We have reached the consensus in all issues discussed with the European Commission. Yesterday, the College of Commissioners consented to apply to the EU Council for implementation of the Plan. The investments and reforms we wish to implement with the NRP funds will strengthen the Polish economy, increase its productivity and create new high-quality jobs

– assessed the Minister of Economic Development and Technology Waldemar Buda, who on behalf of the Government has negotiated with the European Commission on the Poland’s NRP.

Three weeks ago, Poland completed its negotiations with the European Commission on the milestones and targets associated with the reforms and investments outlined in the NRP. On 1 June, the European Commission endorsed the Poland’s National Recovery Plan (NRP) – the College of Commissioners agreed to apply to the EU Council for implementation of the Plan.

National Recovery Plan

The Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) is the largest instrument under the European Recovery Plan (NextGeneration EU), constituting the EU response to the crisis emergencies and challenges caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Throughout the EU, the NextGeneration EU translates into approx. EUR 750 billion, including more than 720 billion under the RRF in the form of grants and loans for the new investments, primarily in the green and digital economy. The major goal of involving the additional funds is to increase the economy productivity and creating high-quality jobs.

The condition to receive funds is preparation by the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) by each state. The entity in charge of this process in Poland was the Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy (MDFRP). In May 2021, Poland submitted our NRP to the European Commission.

Under this facility, Poland may look to EUR 58.1 billion (PLN 260 billion), of which EUR 23.9 billion (PLN 107 billion) are non-reimbursable funds. In its NRP submitted to the EC in early May 2021, Poland applied for the maximum grant pool and more than EUR 11 billion of loans.

Payment of funds under the NRP

Endorsement of the Polish NRP by the EU Council will enable Poland to apply for the first tranche of funds. The first application for payment is to cover approx. EUR 2.85 billion from the grant part and approx. EUR 1.35 billion from the loan part, which translates into nearly PLN 19 billion.

The condition for payment of funds by the EC on the basis of the submitted application for periodic payment is achieving the milestones and indicators outlined in the NRP. The individual tranches will be a kind of reward for the member state for implementing the reforms and investments listed in the NRP (thus, they will neither act as a refund of already incurred expenditure, nor be directly associated with the amounts actually paid for implementation of the NRP at the national level).

The first payment application can be filed after the NRP is formally endorsed and will cover the delivered milestones (project eligibility period under the NRP is February 2020; a part of reforms and investments has been already completed or in progress).

In addition, one should remember that receiving the subsequent tranches of funds for specific investments will depend on the progresses in their delivery and shall cover also the implementation of correlated reforms, provided that vast majority of the investments is to be completed in 2025 or 2026.

Commencing the investments under the NRP is not directly associated with its acceptance by the EC/receiving the first tranche of the RRF funds.

The provisions of the Act of 28 April 2022 on the terms and conditions of implementation of tasks financed from the European funds in the 2021-2017 financial perspective (Journal of Laws item 1079), so called „Implementation Act”, enable “bridging funding” of the investment under the NRP’s grant part from national funds until the RRF funds are received.

Upon verifying the demand reported by the ministries early this year, the Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy estimated that the pre-financing of all investments, commencement of which is scheduled this year, will amount to PLN 4.56 billion.

MEDT investments implemented under the National Recovery Plan

This year, the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology intends to commence the investments from the following areas:

• preparation of the investment areas for the investments of key importance to the economy – comprehensive activities related to land reparcelling, regulation of technical and legal issues, extension of the necessary infrastructure (water, gas, energy) and construction of the production and storage areas for the industrial and service purposes. 4.2 thousand ha of new lands will be adapted under the NRP by 2025. The NRP allocates approx. PLN 1.35 billion (EUR 300 million) for this task, of which the 2022 demand reported by MEDT exceeds PLN 300 million;
• RES installations delivered by the energy communities – the investments will contribute to development of the local renewable energy sources. While the pre-investment support is targeted onto the activities related to preparation of the optimal legal and organisational formula and business model to establish or develop an energy community, the investment support covers the existing and most advanced/prospective energy communities, implementing the advanced energy services. The NRP allocates approx. PLN 435 million (EUR 97 million) for this purpose, of which this-year MEDT demand reaches nearly PLN 30 million;
• the investments related to the implementation of the spatial planning reforms – to enable adopting of general plans (new local law acts constituting the baseline document for the commune development) by the communes until 2026.  The funds will be allocated for the systemic support of the local government units (LGUs) in the field of new legislation (webinars, guidebook, educational activities), co-financing of preparation of the LGU strategic documents and trainings for the spatial planners involved in the commune development planning. The NRP allocates approx. PLN 900 million (EUR 200 million) for this tasks, of which the 2022 demand reported by MEDT is PLN 22.5 million;
• the investments associated with enhancing the energy efficiency of residential buildings – among others by replacement of ineffective heating sources used for residential premises and hot tap water, followed by thermal insulation of residential buildings. MEDT has been also implementing the investment focused on multi-family buildings and intends to allocate nearly PLN 450 million (EUR 100 million) for this purpose until 2026. This-year demand reported by MEDT amounts to approx. PLN 90 million.

In addition, the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology is in charge of the following activities under the NRP:

• the investments associated with the construction of rental apartments intended for households of low and medium income – the erected buildings will feature the enhanced energy standards. The beneficiaries of this task include the communes (alone) or the communes acting for the social construction investors. The funds to be allocated for this goal reach PLN 3.4 billion (EUR 755 million) from the non-reimbursable (for the communes) loan part;
• the investments related to open competitions enabling acquisition by the entrepreneurs of the funds for transformation of their activity towards circular economy (CE) as well as of the funds for investments in the field of R&D infrastructure to develop the technologies aimed at using waste as secondary raw materials. The NRP allocates EUR 162 million (more than PLN 750 million) for this task;
• the task aiming at the enhanced use of satellite data for the economic and state purposes – this investment of the value exceeding PLN 670 million (EUR 150 million) and implemented by the MEDT in cooperation with the MND provides for the construction of the National Terrestrial Segment and the Satellite Earth Observation System. This infrastructure will contribute to the improved skills and competences of the Polish research and production entities in the field of aerospace and satellite technologies. In addition, this investment will enable support of the environmental monitoring systems, safety hazard and effective use of agricultural areas or spatial planning;
• the investments related to development of the API (Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient) production capacity – the envisaged activities include supporting the development and construction of infrastructure used to produce APIs, generics, biosimilars and medical devices. The innovative technological lines will enable production of key commodities in Poland, which will translate into enhanced safety of the supply chain in a specific group of products and provide the citizens with fast and easy access to medical products and devices. The funds allocated for this investment in the NRP amount to approx. PLN 625 million (EUR 139.5 million) from the loan part.

The primary condition to receive funds from the Recovery and Resilience Facility is the performance of significant structural reforms. In this field, the MEDT, apart from implementation of the reforms directly correlated with the investments referred to above, obliged itself to adopt the legislative package under the NRP in order to simplify the administrative procedures for the citizens and entrepreneurs (so called “legal shield”). This project provides for amendment of more than 50 acts and introducing changes aimed to speed up issuing of the decisions/streamlined proceedings (e.g. by propagation of simplified proceeding or digitisation) as well as abolition of two instances in these proceedings, the nature of which allows to do so. In addition, the planned amendments involve wider use of simple forms, on-line applications and limiting the number of appendices to the applications.