The Azores “are and want to continue to be agents with dignity and a voice in the process of European construction,” said the Vice-President of the Regional Government at the Conference “Cohesion Policy – Current and Future Challenges” held at the Palace of the Captains-General in Angra do Heroísmo.
Artur Lima was referring to the European Commission’s proposal for the next Multiannual Financial Framework 2028-2034.
The minister drew attention to a “centralization that should worry us and which we should look at with scepticism,” noting that the final declaration of the 26th Conference of Presidents of the Outermost Regions, chaired by the Azores in November 2021, “regretted the very poor consultation between the States and the Regions in the design of the national recovery plans.”
Regarding the European Union’s plan for the defense sector and recalling the discussion around reducing the Cohesion budget, Artur Lima argued that “regions that bring geostrategic advantages to the Union, such as the Azores,” should benefit “in a clear and concrete way from this new European course.”
The Azores and the European regions are asking for a European Union that is “more agile, faster, less bureaucratized and with instruments capable of adapting quickly to the needs of the present and the future,” said the Vice-President of the Government.
“But what is now on the table is different, Cohesion as we know it and the principles on which it is based are at stake,” he warned.
Artur Lima states, “Cohesion funds are extremely important for the Azores.”
As an outermost region, he said, the Azores are “an extreme example of all the regional heterogeneity that exists in the EU”.
Therefore, it is essential to “defend a fair Cohesion Policy” that ensures social cohesion, territorial cohesion, sustainability, competitiveness, and prosperity throughout the archipelago.
“Cohesion here is also at the intra-regional level, between all nine of our islands,” he concluded.
The initiative, organized by MEP Paulo do Nascimento Cabral, brought together the Regional Government, political parties with representation in the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of the Azores, the Economic and Social Council of the Azores, social partners, municipalities and parishes to advance the debate in the Region on the future of the European Union’s Cohesion Policy.

In Diário Insular, José Lourenço-director

Translated to English as a community outreach program from the Portuguese Beyond Borders Institute (PBBI) and the Modern and Classical Languages and Literatures Department (MCLL) as part of Bruma Publication and ADMA (Azores-Diaspora Media Alliance) at California State University, Fresno, PBBI thanks Luso Financial for sponsoring NOVIDADES.