WIREDGOV

Statement given yesterday by President von der Leyen on the Netherlands' recovery and resilience plan.

Thank you very much Prime Minister, dear Mark,

Deputy Prime Minister, dear Sigrid,

Thank you very much for having me here, dear Mayor,

Thank you very much for having me here in Rotterdam,

Indeed, Rotterdam is the home of Europe's biggest harbour. You said that it is the heart of the Dutch economy. Well, I would say that as such, the heart of the Dutch economy, it is also a bellwether for the health not only of the Dutch economy, but also of the European economy. So, if the port is doing well, our economy is also doing well.

This port really is Europe's gateway for trade with the rest of the world. To be the gateway for trade with the rest of the world, you need the capacity and you need to innovate. And I know that this is very dear to your heart. So, Rotterdam is a model for both. The project we visited this afternoon illustrates this perfectly. I must say that I was fascinated to visit the Alphenaar. It is amazing to see that battery-powered ship, which is demonstrating the zero-emission inland waterway project that has been developed here. As we all know, transport is one of the sectors where the carbon emissions, at the moment being, are rising, going thus against the trend that we have in all the other sectors, that the CO2 emissions are decreasing. So it is of utmost importance that we innovate and that we have solutions, for example also in the maritime transport. And we all know that maritime transport uses normally heavy fuels that not only emit, but also pollute. Therefore, this project is more than welcome, precisely because it will help tackle the environmental challenges in a coherent way. It is clean. It is circular, as we could see. And it helps obviously also stabilising the grid. So there are a lot of good points in that. Therefore, I hope that the Alphenaar will soon be joined by many, many sister ships that will criss-cross the famous canals you have here in the Netherlands, without any emissions and pollution. I think that the Alphenaar is typical for the type of project we support with NextGenerationEU. Indeed, we want to speed up the twin transition – the European Green Deal and the digitalisation – through intelligent investments and through reforms, and thereby ensure a broad-based economic recovery, initially after the pandemic, but now we also see that it is more needed than ever.

The Netherlands' NextGenerationEU plan does just that. You have a share of almost 50% devoted to climate measures, to the European Green Deal, and 26% for digital projects – thus is by far overshooting the requirements of NextGenerationEU. So, congratulations for that. The focus is particularly on the development of renewables, both from the climate perspective and in view of the need to get rid of the Russian fossil fuels' dependency. This is of utmost importance now. The Dutch plan devotes over EUR 2 billion in green investments. It is coupled with fiscal reforms to further incentivise investments in this area. But the plan also has, as we have seen, a strong focus on sustainable mobility for maritime, but also for rail and air transport. And it includes the other dimensions of the environmental protection, for example through an ambitious nature restoration scheme. This is the green part, almost 50% of the plan, and much more is in it.

But if we look at the digital side, the Netherlands, of course, we know, is home to world champions, like ASML, we have visited it together – amazing, fascinating. And therefore, of course, the plan focuses on boosting innovation through the development of applications of quantum technology and artificial intelligence solutions. Beyond the climate and beyond the digital priorities, the Dutch plan also focuses on other challenges facing society and the economy. This is notably the case for the housing market. With almost EUR 1.4 billion in investment for the construction of housing, this is in fact the largest component of the plan. And of course, this aims to combine both the environmental protection – insulating, for example houses, is the way to go – and of course also social fairness. The plan includes a series of reforms to continue improving one of the Netherlands' traditional strong points: that is your people and their skills – so, a lot of investment in upskilling and reskilling. And the plan includes reforms to strengthen the public health sector, the pandemic preparedness – we have learnt our lesson from the pandemic. And finally, the plan addresses aggressive tax planning and money laundering, two issues that are important for the good functioning of our Single Market.

I could go on forever, but I will stop here. This is not the end of the journey, it is the beginning because, of course, now it is about implementing. But you were right, there is a rumour out there that we now approve, by giving you the famous yellow booklet, your recovery and resilience plan. So, congratulations for that.

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