National recovery plan KPO implementation may be extendable by few months
It may be possible to extend the implementation of the national recovery plan KPO by a few months, but there will certainly be no multi-year extensions, Deputy Minister of Development Funds and Regional Policy Jan Szyszko told TOK FM. He suggested a proposal that unused funds from the reconstruction fund could be used for so-called dual-use infrastructure, such as motorways.
"The national recovery plan KPO in the main grant part we have to finish by August 2026 - a very difficult task (...), that's why we have gone through one revision of the KPO, now we are starting another revision of the KPO - all in order to invest these non-refundable grants by the August 2026 deadline, a very, very ambitious deadline," Szyszko said.
Asked whether it would be possible to negotiate a longer timeframe for the KPO with the EC during the Polish presidency, he replied that Poland was in talks on the matter, but that there would certainly be no multi-year extensions.
"Of course, many countries are talking about moving this deadline, we are also talking about it, but we also have to stand in the truth and see what is possible and what is unlikely," Szyszko said.
"A significant extension of the deadline for the national recovery plan KPO, or rather the reconstruction fund, would require an amendment to the EU regulation, and for this in turn we need the agreement of the majority of member states - this agreement, to put it bluntly, is not there at the moment and most likely will not be," he added.
As he explained, there is a group of countries in the European Union, located in the north and west of the continent, which are very sceptical about the EU taking on a common debt and the very idea of the Reconstruction Fund, and which will not agree to a change in the regulation.
Asked whether Poland would have to return the funds if they were not used, he replied that there was no answer to that at the moment.
"It seems to me that it would be worth considering, however, investing these funds for purposes that reflect the challenges we are facing, which is security," the deputy minister said.
It is difficult to fund security investments with EU funds at the moment, he noted.
"It seems to me that a good proposal would be to loosen these rules so that we can finance to a greater extent what is called dual-use infrastructure," Szyszko indicated.
"I mean, for example, motorways, which are built in such a way that, if necessary, they can quickly and efficiently transport war equipment, and this applies to all infrastructure, i.e. railways and other networks for the transport of people and raw materials," he pointed out.
On December 17, the ministry announced that PLN 40 billion (EUR 9.4 bln) from the 2nd and 3rd applications for payment from the funds under the national recovery plan KPO had been received, making a total of PLN 67 billion (EUR 15.7 bln) that had flowed to Poland under the KPO.
The Ministry indicated that the funds from the last payment will be invested in, among others: cancer hospitals, Polish wind farms in the Baltic Sea, modernisation of energy networks, food security and spatial planning.
At the same time, the Ministry announced that later this year Poland plans to send the 4th and 5th applications for payment from the national recovery plan KPO.
jz/ han/
