Executive summary

• Author: Naldini, Andrea; Pompili, Marco; Peruccacci, Eleonora
• Pages: 8-17

8

Executive Summ ary

The Fact-finding study on the

implem entat ion of t he evaluat ion

requirem ents foreseen by t he GBER and

relev ant guidelines analy ses t he

implem entat ion of t he evalu ation

requirem ent s as defined by bot h t he

General Block Exemption Regulation

(GBER) and the European Com mission ’s

( EC) re lev ant g uid elin es t o inf orm th e EC

policy making with findings and lessons

learnt. I n particu lar, the st udy aim s to

assess t he efficiency of the

implem entat ion of t he evaluat ion

requirem ent s fr om a legal,

organisat ion al and t ech nica l p ers pect iv e.

To achiev e this goal the st udy analyses

the national requirem ent s fo r the

ev aluat ion of St at e ai d in th e 2 7 MSs and

the UK ( under task 1) and t he

implem entat ion of t he evaluat ion

requirem ent s in t he 14 MSs an d t he UK

for which an evaluat ion plan w as either

under discussion or approv ed by a

Commission decision , by the end of

Decem ber 201 9 ( under t ask 2).

Th e m ain r esult s of t ask 1

Task 1 focused on the nat iona l ru les and

capacity in t he evaluation of St at e aid

schemes. The first finding of task 1

concer ns the possible adm inistrative

burden deriving from the evalu at ion of

State a id sc hem es: in cou ntr ies cove ring

around 70% of t he EU St at e aid

expenditur e, obligat ions to evaluate

alr eady exist and, consequently, a

higher quota of St ate aid schemes cou ld

be ev aluated wit hout excessiv e

add itional burden.

On the oth er hand, if the m ain pri ority is

t o in vol ve all th e co unt ri es i n ev alu at ions

of Stat e aid, t he potential bur den could

be sign if icant i n so me of th em . Ho wev er,

the ev aluation unit s creat ed for ESI F

programmes ar e widespread an d

relat ively developed in many cou ntries;

a mor e di rect inv olve men t of t hese u nit s

in Stat e aid evaluation m ay reduce t he

adm inist rat iv e impact of new

evaluations.

Monet ar y costs of t he evaluat ions are

modest and represent a minim al quota

of t he b udget for State aid .

Consequen tly, we can st at e that

adm inist rat iv e costs do not r epresent a

significant obst acle t o the evaluation of

aid schemes; however, they m ust be

consider ed from the perspective of

reinforcing eva luat ion act ivities.

A secon d im portant aspect concerns the

type of evaluation. I n pract ice, all MSs

implem ent some kind of evaluat ion of

State aid schem es. I n coun tries where

im pact evaluat ions are not car ried out,

ex-ante assessments t o verify

com pliance with EU rules and n at ional

budget constraints are g enerally

im plem ented. Every count ry has set up

a more or less sophist icated aid scheme

monitoring system to v er ify St ate aid

expenditur es, identif y beneficiaries and

to provide the EC w it h t he requ ir ed

inform ation . Expanding and

consolidat ing these systems a nd th e ex -

post assessments in their regular

act iv ities would be a logical integr at ion

of t he exist in g nat ional system s for

controlling State aid and the

organisat ion ther eof w ou ld n ot require

excessive effort.

A t hird aspect concern s t he willingness

to evaluat e. The analysis shows how

count r ies w ith obligat ions t o ev aluate

have built up t heir ev aluat ion capacity

over m any years of political and

adm inist rat iv e commit m en t to assess

public policies. Instead, in som e

cou nt ries wit hou t eval uat ion obl igat ion s,

the m anagem ent of St ate aid is

organised m or e to addr ess EC r eq uests

and com ply wit h EU r ules rather t han to

examine the efficien cy and t he

effect iveness of the aid schemes. It is

not easy to im prove and reinforce t he

com m itment to evaluate. As all the

national m an agem ent system s of State