Un collegamento più forte tra politica di coesione dell’Unione europea e solidarietà: il pacchetto di assistenza alla ripresa per la coesione e i territori d'Europa (REACT-EU)

Among the initiatives that make up NextGeneration EU, the focus of public opinion and commentators has been on the Recovery and Resilience Facility, given (inter alia)its economic size. The purpose of this article is to illustrate the second most funded initiative, to which EUR 47.5 billion has been allocated. This is the Recovery Assistance for Cohesion and the Territories of Europe, known as REACT-EU, which complements the European Regional Development Fund, the European Social Fund and the Fund for European Aid to the Most Deprived for the period 2014-2020 in order to promote resilience from the crisis and contribute to a green, digital and resilient economy. The article provides an overview of the measures taken by the EU in general to cope with the economic fallout of the COVID-19 crisis and then focuses on those related to cohesion policy. Afterwards, REACT-EU is presented and some issues concerning the absorption capacity of resources and distribution criteria are considered. The conclusions are devoted to the use of the funds made available by REACT-EU in Italy