CONCORD Europas uttalande om EU:s kommande långtidsbudget

CONCORD’s concerns and redlines on the European Commission proposal for a single External Instrument – April 2018

The architecture of the future MFF must directly support and lead to the achievement of development cooperation objectives, namely poverty eradication and the transformation towards sustainable development. For both, it is crucial that human rights be realised and that no one is left behind. The EU’s commitment to sustainable development was expressed throughout the negotiation processes of the Agenda 2030 and the Paris Agreement, and was further confirmed in the recently adopted European Consensus on Development. These commitments must now drive the next generation of EU development cooperation instruments.

While we fully acknowledge that many improvements could be made to the current MFF, we are convinced that the Commission’s proposal to create a single External Instrument by merging twelve very different existing instruments and increasing the share of non-DAC-able actions will not allow the EU to live up to its commitments. This paper sets out our concerns regarding the current proposal as well as the “must haves” and red lines which should underpin any future architecture of external instruments. In a brief third section, we reiterate CONCORD’s preferred architecture, which could meet the concerns expressed.