A backward budget?

During her visit to Poland the European Commissioner for Financial Programming and Budget, Dalia Grybauskaite, took part in a debate about the economic prospects for Europe and Poland. The Commissioner voiced some serious reservations about the EU budget for 2007-2013. She points out that 80 percent of the funds in the budget are devoted to agriculture and cohesion programs, while competitiveness was assigned just EUR 74 (zł.228) billion out of the budget total of EUR 864.3 (zł.3.364) billion. "This budget is not modern enough for tomorrow's Europe," Grybauskaite complained. Indeed, tomorrow's Europe will face the challenge of not only catching up with the US, but will also have to compete with rapidly growing Asian economies.

On the other hand, for new EU members the budget is seen as a chance to make a "civilisation jump," as Deputy Finance Minister and former Minister for EU Affairs Jarosław Pietras put it.

Although the Commissioner doubts the budget will fuel rapid economic progress on the continent, Pietras thinks that Poland should benefit from the budget. He underlined that 'old' and 'new' Europe have different priorities.

"The most important thing is the modernizing effects of the budget sources on the Polish economy," Pietras said. He pointed to the example of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) and cohesion funds. "The CAP is a very strong modernizing factor for Polish agriculture, while in the West it is a means of preserving the status quo," he said. In terms of cohesion policy, Poland will be one of the largest recipients of aid, receiving 12 percent of all funds this year.