The Structural Funds în Finland

The purpose of his research project is briefly presentation of The Structural Funds in Finland.

The research project encompassed the following objectives:

- Short presentation of Finland and it’s way to become the European Union Member State,

- Explanation how The Structural Funds were used in Finland in the past funding periods,

- Shedding light on the previous funding period in Finland

The research in the last part of the project consist of three phases. First phase analyze the general facts of funding for 2007-2013 period in Finland, while the second one presents the changes in management system of them. The third phase pays attention on international cooperation between Finland and other countries during the 2007-2013 funding period..

The study for the project was based mainly on reading and analyzing materials from the European Institution’s and the Finnish Government’s websites, as well as from essays and brochures about the European Union and the Structural Funds. Most of materials were found in the Internet.

Abstract

The Republic of Finland is a Nordic country, situated in Northern Europe. It is the eight largest country in Europe (in the terms of area) with around 5,3 million residents.

Finland joined the European Union (EU) on

1 January 1995. The accession was preceded by a referendum which took place 16th of October 1994 and in which 70,4% of Finnish population was voting. 56,9% of voters were in favor of Finland’s membership of the European Union.

Finland has always been a unitary state with strong central administration and highly autonomic local level authorities. Membership in the European Union meant strengthening of the regional level administration, new legislation and administrative bodies.

Being a member state of the EU, Finland is taking part with other European countries in implementing the European Cohesion Policy. The main goal is to reduce gaps in development and disparities of well-being between citizens and between regions, as well as making the EU the most competitive and knowledge-driven economy by 2010.

Source: http://www.fao.org/fi/fcp/en/FIN/body.htm

To realize that goals EU members have financial support from the European Union by instruments called European Funds. There are two main funds:

1. The Structural Funds

European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)

European Social Fund (EFS)

2. The Cohesion Fund.

Introduction

The Structural Funds and The Cohesion Funds are funds allocated by the European Union for two related purposes: support for the poorer regions of Europe and support for integrating European infrastructure especially in the transport sector .

Each funding period lasts for seven years, and there are always different objectives established.

Each seven years priorities for the Structural Funds are set at an EU level which Member States and Regions then transform into national priorities.

At the EU level the overarching priorities are established in the Community Strategic Guidelines (CSG) setting the framework for all actions that can be taken using the Funds. Within this framework, each Member State has its own National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) which sets the priorities for the Member State ensuring linkages with their own National policies. Finally, the Operational Programmes for each regions within the Member state are drawn up to reflect the needs of the regions restrained only by the NSRF.

There are two funds as a part of the Structural Funds that this project are going to present in details. Firstly, it is the European Regional Development Fund, which in short finances :

- direct aid to investments in companies (in particular SMEs) to create sustainable jobs;

- infrastructures linked notably to research and innovation, telecommunications, environment, energy and transport;

- financial instruments (capital risk funds, local development funds, etc.) to support regional and local development and to foster cooperation between towns and regions;

- technical assistance measures.

The ERDF can intervene in the three objectives of regional policy:

- Convergence;

- Regional Competitiveness and Employment;

- European Territorial Cooperation.