Brussels gives green light to eight RRP cheque today

The European Commission is set to give the green light to the release of the eighth cheque for Portugal’s Recovery and Resilience Plan (RRP) tomorrow, meaning that 61% of the monies (loans and grants) will have been paid out.

“The implementation of the RRP will increase to 61% because the eighth payment request will be approved,” the Minister of the Economy and Territorial Cohesion, Manuel Castro Almeida revealed to the Portuguese parliament’s Economic Committee. “This is exactly what was foreseen in the initial RRP model,” he added.

Portugal submitted its eighth payment request to the European Commission on November 14. At stake is €1.16Bn net not taking into account the amounts already received from the pre-financing, an amount that has not been revised upwards despite the fact that milestones and targets have been advanced.

This request had 22 milestones and targets whose fulfillment translated into €828.82 million in grants and €333.82 in loans in net terms.

But now there are 14 more milestones and targets anticipated following the reprogramming of the RRP submitted to Brussels on October 31, meaning the payment of the cheque is conditioned by the verification of a total of 36 milestones and targets.

SOURCE: ECO