For the 2014-2020 financial framework of European Structural and Investments Funds, Slovenia was allocated a total of €3.9 billion, which, added to a national contribution of €1 billion, see the country reaching a total budget of €4.9 billion to be invested in various areas. In fact, this budget is intended to be used through four national and regional programmes to:

• Enhance R&I’s (research and innovation) infrastructure and capacities in order to increase R&D’s expenditure in relation to national GDP;

• Support SMEs, helping to improve entrepreneurial activity, increase productivity and raise the added value of enterprises;

• Improve the business environment by strengthening services to enterprises and facilitating access to finance;

• Reduce greenhouse gas emissions, increase the use of renewable energy sources and invest in the efficient and sustainable use of resources;

• Invest in environmental protection, support risk prevention and flood protection measures, improve the urban environment;

• Improve infrastructure in the water sector, make fisheries and aquaculture more sustainable, preserve biodiversity and marine ecosystems;

• Enable more people to benefit from improved water supply and better waste-water treatment;

• Remove bottlenecks in the TEN-T network and increase sustainability and quality of transport infrastructure;

• Support sustainable and quality employment, with initiatives to benefit the long-term unemployed, the low-skilled, older workers and young people;

• Invest in education, training and vocational training for skills;

• Tackle poverty and discrimination by promoting social inclusion;

• Invest in institutional capacity-building in the public sector, and in the efficiency of public administration at national, regional and local levels.

The Slovenian government has been focused on investing the budget of the European Structural and Investment Funds mainly to support and help national small and medium enterprises. 

To do so, the country’s government assigned almost €1 billion, mostly coming from two different Funds, the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD): the ERDF granted around €600 million to the cause, while the EAFRD assigned to this specific theme of investment a budget in the area of €360 million; the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF) contributed with €11 million. As shown in Chart 1, the second theme of investment in the agenda of the Slovenian government is to improve environmental protection and resource efficiency. The ERDF, EAFRD, EMFF and Cohesion Fund (CF) are contributing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase the use of renewable energy sources with a combined budget of more than €800 million divided as such: the ERDF allocated €195 million, the CF €330 million, the EAFRD €270 million and the EMFF €8 million. Very relevant for Slovenia is also a boost to the research and innovation infrastructure and capacities, with the ERDF investing €590 million and the EAFRD contributing for as little as €26 million.

In order to understand thoroughly the composition of the EU funding budget of Slovenia, Chart 2 breaks down the amount of money that each Fund is giving to the country, by showing their share in the €4.9 billion budget.

With 36.8%, the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) is the largest contributor to European funding in Slovenia, granting more than €1.8 billion alone. The European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) also holds an important role, as it accounts for 22.3%, around €1.1 billion, while the Cohesion Fund (CF) grants €1 billion and reports a 21.7% share in the total budget. Fourth is the European Social Fund (ESF) that sees an allocation of €900 million towards social topics and a share in the total budget of 18.1%. With only 0.6% and 0.4% each, the European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF) and the Youth Employment Initiative (YEI) contribute together for only €50 million to the Slovenian budget of EU funding.

The country’s absorption rates are slightly higher compared to the European Union average. With a 29% share of spent funding from the ESIF, Slovenia is just 1% above the European average of 28%, meaning that more than €1.4 billion have already been invested. Slovenia is very effective when it comes to assigning funds: in fact, the country has allocated 77% of its total budget, 12% above the EU average of 65%, meaning that €3.8 billion have been assigned to projects and other initiatives.

Nevertheless, the Slovenian government has not done enough to sensibly improve its results: in fact, the Slovenian absorption rates for spent funding of 2019 have seen an increase of just 2% from the ones of 2018, whereas the percentage for allocated funding has not increased at all, scoring 77% in both 2018 and 2019.

In conclusion, Slovenia registers absorption rates that are slightly better when compared to the European Union average, but at the same time the country’s rates for the 2018-2019 biennium show that there was not a substantial increase and that there is still lots of room for improvement for the last year of the Financial Framework.