Brussels will assess RRP request by March

  • Lusa
  • 26 January 2022

The EU confirmed this Wednesday that it had received Portugal's first request for payment of €1336 billion in the Recovery and Resilience Plan framework.

The European Commission confirmed on Wednesday that it had received Portugal’s first request for payment of €1336 billion in the Recovery and Resilience Plan framework, which it will evaluate within two months.

Brussels said that this first request for disbursement of funds from the European ‘bazooka’ – which follows the pre-financing of €2.2 billion that Portugal received in summer 2021, equivalent to 13% of the total amount of the RRP – relates to €553 million in outright grants and €609 million in loans.

“The Commission now has two months to make its assessment. It will then tell the Economic and Financial Committee of the [EU] Council its preliminary assessment of Portugal’s compliance with the milestones and targets required for this payment,” the EU executive explained in a statement released today in Brussels, confirming the government’s expectations of receiving the first disbursement in the first quarter of the year.

The RRP, which runs until 2026, aims to implement reforms and investments to recover economic growth. Besides aiming to repair the damage caused by Covid-19, this plan also supports investments and generates employment.

The total allocation of the RRP exceeds €16.6 billion, distributed across its three structuring dimensions – resilience (€11.125 billion), climate transition (€3.059 billion) and digital transition (€2.46 billion).