1. PURPOSE: This data set provides, in a single source, regionalised (NUTS-2) annual EU expenditure data (in current prices) for specific EU funds - ERDF, Cohesion Fund, EAFRD/EAGGF and ESF. This data can be used, among other purposes, to facilitate analysis on the effects of the EU funds.

In terms of the regionalisation of EU payments made, this work expands and replaces data sets previous published on the ERDF and Cohesion fund with additional years and additional EU funds.
The following studies on ERDF and Cohesion fund expenditure are to a large extent now superseded:
- "Geography of expenditure" Work Package 13 of the ERDF and CF ex-post evaluation 2007-2013 - http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/en/policy/evaluations/ec/2007-2013/#13
- "Final Report - ERDF and CF Regional Expenditure" (2000-2006) - SWECo 2008 - http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/docgener/evaluation/pdf/expost2006/expenditure_final.pdf
- "The Territorial Effects of the Structural Funds" (1994-1999) - ESPON 2005, study 2.2.1 - http://www.espon.eu/main/Menu_Projects/Menu_ESPON2006Projects/Menu_PolicyImpactProjects/structuralfundsimpact.html

The dataset does not contain any identification of the thematic nature of the investments made. This is because there was no harmonised system or information available across funds and across programme periods to estimate the thematic composition of the investments. For the ERDF and Cohesion Fund the studies cited above provided some thematic information for specific programme periods.

2. SCOPE

2.1 REGIONALISATION: This dataset provides the most complete historic picture available to date on the annual EU payments made - in EUR in current prices of the year in question (not adjusted or expressed as “in 2015 prices”) - under different shared management funds mapped to or estimated by NUTS-2 regions;
=> presented in the column "EU_payment_annual".

The work undertaken to regionalise the payment data is predominantly based on the NUTS-2013 version as described in the final report of the 2016 WIIW study (link below). In case the EU funded programmes covered more than one NUTS-2 region the regionalisation of the payments was carried out using either (1) regionalised data provided by the managing authorities or (2) the application of certain apportioning rules to the payments in order to estimate the share of the payment by NUTS-2 region.

In regionalising the data, information on the specific national or regional funding programme, which were the source of the payments, was not retained in the processing of the dataset.

2.2 MODELLING OF “REAL” EXPENDITURE: The yearly breakdown of the dataset follows the cycle of the European Commission payments to the Member States and not the date on which real expenditures took place on the ground. This characteristic may negatively affect any subsequent analytic work to carry out policy assessments.

In order to develop a more realistic estimate of the annual profile of real expenditure, the Commission tasked BERGEN to undertake work to develop a modelling of the “real” annual expenditure on the ground, and to test the robustness and sensitivity of assumptions used (see link to final report below).
=> the modelled annual expenditure is presented in the column "Modelled_annual_expenditure" and it represents the mean of 100 000 simulations on the annual EU payments to estimate real expenditure.
=> The column "Standard_Deviation_of modelled_annual_expenditure" provides the standard deviation of the “modelled_annual_expenditure" which is the root mean square of the set of deviations between each estimated annual payment in 100 000 simulations and the mean of the estimations, presented in the column "Modelled_annual_expenditure”.
=> The column "Standard_Error_of_modelled_annual_expenditure" provides the Standard Error of the "Modelled_annual_expenditure", which is a measure of how far this mean is likely to be from its expected value; that is, its scatter in repeated ex

This file contains "categorisation data" from the ERDF/ESF/Cohesion Fund programmes as adopted (including modifications). The data is in current prices. It is regularly updated to reflect reprogramming notified by the programmes.

The data is provided in tables, one for each priority axis (investment pillar), for each specific programme. The categorisation system is defined in Implementing Regulation 215/2014 with 8 dimensions - http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32014R0215.
These dimension represent different ways of categorising the nature of the EU support (i.e. the intervention (activity) field, the form of finance, the territorial context, etc.).
In the programme documents only 4 dimensions were encoded for ERDF/ Cohesion Fund while 5 dimensions were encoded for ESF and can be found in the dataset. In analysing the content of the dataset the different dimension should be analysed separately - **NEVER AGGREGATE VALUES ACROSS DIMENSIONS** as otherwise double counting of the financial amounts will occur.

A second dataset found here - https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/EU-Level/ESIF-2014-2020-Categorisation-Crosscutting-Themes-/xns4-t7ym - provides a lookup table for understanding how the Commission uses the intervention field codes to look at cross cutting issues such as investments in "innovation", "enterprise support", etc. That lookup dataset also has the "climate change tracking" weightings and a similar weighting system for "biodiversity tracking".

The Intervention field dimension is the most complete of the the different dimensions in terms of financial coverage. (NB although the SME initiative programmes were not asked to provide categorisation tables, because of simplified programming requirements, they have been manually added by DG REGIO.)

The total investments under other dimension may vary for different reasons (i.e. Technical assistance priority axes are not encoded in all dimensions, etc.)

If downloading, check the format of financial amounts and where necessary change your regional settings and default formatting in your chosen software. You can check the results of your aggregation of the financial data by comparing results with the pre-formatted charts profiled on this metadata page under “featured content”.

This file contains "categorisation data" from the ERDF/ESF/Cohesion Fund programmes as adopted (including modifications). The data is in current prices. It is regularly updated to reflect reprogramming notified by the programmes.

The data is provided in tables, one for each priority axis (investment pillar), for each specific programme. The categorisation system is defined in Implementing Regulation 215/2014 with 8 dimensions - http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A32014R0215.
These dimension represent different ways of categorising the nature of the EU support (i.e. the intervention (activity) field, the form of finance, the territorial context, etc.).
In the programme documents only 4 dimensions were encoded for ERDF/ Cohesion Fund while 5 dimensions were encoded for ESF and can be found in the dataset. In analysing the content of the dataset the different dimension should be analysed separately - **NEVER AGGREGATE VALUES ACROSS DIMENSIONS** as otherwise double counting of the financial amounts will occur.

A second dataset found here - https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/EU-Level/ESIF-2014-2020-Categorisation-Crosscutting-Themes-/xns4-t7ym - provides a lookup table for understanding how the Commission uses the intervention field codes to look at cross cutting issues such as investments in "innovation", "enterprise support", etc. That lookup dataset also has the "climate change tracking" weightings and a similar weighting system for "biodiversity tracking".

The Intervention field dimension is the most complete of the the different dimensions in terms of financial coverage. (NB although the SME initiative programmes were not asked to provide categorisation tables, because of simplified programming requirements, they have been manually added by DG REGIO.)

The total investments under other dimension may vary for different reasons (i.e. Technical assistance priority axes are not encoded in all dimensions, etc.)

If downloading, check the format of financial amounts and where necessary change your regional settings and default formatting in your chosen software. You can check the results of your aggregation of the financial data by comparing results with the pre-formatted charts profiled on this metadata page under “featured content”.

This dataset presents information on EU payments to the Regional Policy supported programmes.
Annual snapshots are provided in the data and therefore the data must be filtered by year to have an accurate view of the total EU planned amount and payments made.
Data is reported on cumulative basis, i.e. the amounts shown in 2017 represent the cumulative payments made from the beginning of the programming period (2014-2017 up to date).
The dataset is updated on a daily basis.

2021-2027 financial details broken down by Fund / MS / programme / Policy objective / specific objective / Categorisation dimension

This dataset presents information on EU payments to the Regional Policy supported programmes.
Annual snapshots are provided in the data and therefore the data must be filtered by year to have an accurate view of the total EU planned amount and payments made.
Data is reported on cumulative basis, i.e. the amounts shown in 2017 represent the cumulative payments made from the beginning of the programming period (2014-2017 up to date).
The dataset is updated on a daily basis.

This dataset provides information on expected achievements (targets) set for selected common indicators defined for the each of the specific ESI funds and the decided (forecasts from selected projects) and implemented values.

The reference date for the annual reporting of progress by the programmes achievements is the end of each calendar year.
This dataset was extracted on **12 December 2017** and contains:
- Time series of the cumulative amounts reported annually for decided and implemented values (i.e. 2016 values include the 2015 values);
- To avoid double counting, the cumulative values from different years **should NOT be aggregated**;
- Allows comparison of the targets year on year (targets change with reallocation of financial resources);
- Allows comparison of decided (forecast) and implemented values with the targets set (allowing users to calculate the % rate of progress);
- For ESF / YEI only the implemented values are reported (no decided (forecast) values) and targets were not obligatory in each case.

For more information on the common indicator definitions used by each fund please go to the "Related Information" sections at the bottom of the fund specific pages.