Barnabas: “Thanks to the Government of Pedro Sánchez, the EU Solidarity Fund has increased and others have been created to deal with the recovery after the damage”

The delegate of the Government in the Valencian Community, Pilar Bernabé, highlights the work of the Government of Spain to “obtain funds that did not exist or achieve an increase in the already existing funds to deal with natural disasters such as the dana” and assures that “the Government of Spain is taking advantage of all the European support mechanisms to accelerate the recovery and reconstruction of the affected areas”.

In particular, on the proposal of Pedro Sánchez, it has been possible to modify the regulation of funds for cohesion as a matter of urgency, which will allow the use of funds reserved for cohesion in reconstruction and recovery.

In addition, “thanks to the Government of Spain, the European Union Solidarity Fund has increased from 1,124 to 1,500 million euros for aid to countries affected by disasters in 2025,” said Bernabé. In fact, the Spanish Government has requested the urgent processing of aid from the EU Solidarity Fund for the Valencia dana, from the 2025 budget, and the urgent procedure will be activated in the European Parliament to facilitate its approval as soon as possible.

In addition, a separate proposal from the European Commission proposes amending the EAFRD to allow Member States affected by natural disasters to use unused appropriations within the framework of rural development programmes to quickly help post-disaster recovery.

The Government of Spain has even proposed to the European Commission an amendment to the Recovery and Resilience Plan to redirect the available funds to the “reconstruction and relaunch” of the Valencian economy worth 1.5 billion euros.

On the other hand, emergency support mechanisms such as the Copernicus satellite system, activated specifically on October 30, have been used to provide accurate geospatial information for risk assessment, immediate response, recovery and assessment of damage in the Huerta Sur of Valencia.

Likewise, “the Government of Spain has requested through the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism a total of 100 high-capacity pumping equipment and 50 technical assistance and support experts, among other means, to work in the field,” said Pilar Bernabé, with the aim of strengthening the operations of emptying high-density sludge in garages and sewers, cleaning of vials or recovery of water purification plants.

Finally, the European Commission has opened the door to a certain margin of fiscal flexibility to deal with reconstruction spending and the European Investment Bank prepared an immediate response of 900 million euros to speed up the deployment of existing initiatives and support the reconstruction of critical infrastructures by regional authorities and public bodies in the affected areas in Spain.

European funds in response to the dana:

1. Solidarity Fund: These funds are intended to enable countries to deal with the damage caused by a natural disaster and are intended to be urgent. The total amount of the fund is 1.5 billion for the whole of Europe.
2. Cohesion Funds: The modification of the RESTORE has made it possible to use the cohesion funds to repair the structural damage caused by a natural disaster. They have a vocation of reconstructiveness. The amount for this year is 3,000 for the whole of Europe.
3. EAFRD Funds: They assume that, following an urgent procedure, Member States affected by natural disasters can use unused appropriations under rural development programmes (RDPs) to quickly help the recovery of affected farmers and fields.