On 31 December, payment claims were submitted to the European Commission for the 51 regional and national operational programmes co-financed by the ERDF and ESF; only 3 programmes failed to meet their spending targets, including the National Operational Programme (NOP) for Research and Innovation (ERDF) and the NOP for Inclusion (ESF). In total, the certified expenditure incurred amounts to €9.75 billion, with the resource drawdown level reaching 118% of the target. These results have enabled the spending thresholds set for 31 December to be comfortably exceeded. The Lombardy ERDF Regional Operational Programme recorded a payment claim 14% higher than the target. For further information and detailed data, please refer to the official website of the Agency for Territorial Cohesion by clicking here .

These positive figures are confirmed at the EU level in the Report on the implementation of the 2014-2020 structural funds, updated to October 2018. The report, published in December, indicates that almost two-thirds of the 2014-2020 structural funds have been committed to concrete projects. Specifically, by the end of 2017, 1 million businesses, including 74,000 start-ups, had received support for growth and innovation activities. Furthermore, €9.8 billion has been committed to projects related to the digitalisation of businesses and infrastructure. For further details, please refer to the full report, which can be downloaded by clicking here.

The progress status of fund utilisation, updated to December 2018, can be viewed on the ESIF Open Data platform ( https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/ ).