The prime ministers of the Visegrad Group (V4), including Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico, discussed on Tuesday in Budapest the priorities for the new programming period of EU funds for the years 2014 to 2020. They agreed that more attention should be concentrated on supporting research, science, and innovation.
“These are very important investment and structural funds we need to see as an investment”, said European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso who was at the event. At a meeting with the four prime ministers of Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia, Barroso also addressed the issue of fiscal consolidation. “We insist on their commitments to structural reforms. If we can spend this money wisely, we can provide a very important stimulus for growth and job creation; what the citizens of Europe expect from us”, said Barroso. “These investments will help us to ramp up growth in Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia, but also will help us achieve the European objectives for growth, which we formed in Europe 2020”, he added.
