News item | 14-04-2022 | 15:15
An investment of €5 billion and an additional reserve of €1.3 billion for a total of 28 projects should ensure sustainable economic growth in the Netherlands. With this money from the National Growth Fund, the government is investing in, among other things, the digitization of higher education and MBO, green hydrogen projects and the improvement of the preclinical phase of cancer research. With this, the cabinet has fully adopted the advice of the independent advisory committee led by Jeroen Dijsselbloem. Minister Adriaansens of Economic Affairs and Climate and Minister Kaag of Finance announced this today.
The committee advises the government to allocate €5 billion from the National Growth Fund, with certain conditions still applying to some of these allocations (€3.7 billion). Additional steps must be taken for €1.3 billion in reservations before a final decision is made. The decision means that the government will (conditionally) allocate or reserve a total of € 6.3 billion. Projects are financed on average for 50% from the fund and for the other half by public and private parties. This means that total investments for this round could exceed €12 billion in the coming years.
Minister Adriaansens: “Our current prosperity and the large government expenditure of today would not have been possible without investments from the past. I want us to be able to continue to invest in society in the future. To pay for that, we need economic growth. The National Growth Fund makes sustainable growth possible: the prosperity of tomorrow starts today.”
Jeroen Dijsselbloem, chairman of the advisory committee: “We have a nicely varied package of proposals. Both large and with guts (Einstein Telescope) and small projects with a lot of impact, for example CROP-XR, for the fast and efficient development of climate-resistant crops. The committee also considers it essential to invest in the quality of education and Lifelong Development. Because we need more professionals to ensure that projects are carried out. A nice interaction of the investments.”
National Growth Fund
The National Growth Fund was launched in 2020 with the aim of strengthening the sustainable earning capacity of the Netherlands. Together with initiators, the National Growth Fund invests in projects that ensure sustainable economic growth in the longer term. Economic growth provides scope for continuing to invest in, for example, health care, education and measures against climate change. Growth also provides more income, so that we can also maintain our prosperity in the future.
At the start, the National Growth Fund received € 20 billion for investments in knowledge development, infrastructure and research, development & innovation. It has been agreed in the coalition agreement that the infrastructure site will be removed from the National Growth Fund. This does not apply to the current second round, which had already started at that time. In the first round, the cabinet earmarked €4.1 billion for (conditional) grants and reservations to various projects. The first projects have now started.
In the second round, various ministries, in collaboration with public and private parties, submitted investment proposals to the Growth Fund. In the next, third round, the government wants companies, knowledge and educational institutions, governments, social organizations and other parties to be able to submit their investment proposals directly to the National Growth Fund via a subsidy scheme. In March 2022, the House of Representatives approved the law that makes the necessary subsidy scheme possible. The Senate has yet to decide on this.