No. 34 The future of the Common Agricultural Policy 108 ANALYSIS AND PROSPECTIVE STUDIES CULTIVAR Furthermore, they note that the expanded role of the European Commission – covering the design, negotiation, approval and evaluation of national plans and the assessment of the overall impacts of the mechanism – creates a risk of conflicts of interest and may compromise objectivity. The authors conclude that these shortcomings have important implications for the design of the performance framework for the first pillar of the next MFF, which provides for national plans in a performance-based context for accessing funds, including cohesion and agricultural funds. Chapter 5 assesses the budgetary impacts of possible EU enlargements, arguing that the impact assessment related to any addition of new EU members should cover both the EU budget and national budgets. The change in Europe's geopolitical landscape resulting from Russia's war with Ukraine has opened the EU's doors to nine new candidate members with low levels of economic development. Added to this is Ukraine's huge agricultural sector, which could have profound implications for the EU's two largest expenditure programmes: cohesion policy and the CAP. It concludes, however, that the financial impact of enlargement on the MFF would be manageable, stressing that the assessment must also take into account the economic and fiscal gains that enlargement will generate for current EU members and their national budget revenues. Conclusions The Bruegel report assesses the alignment of current EU expenditure with the concept of European public goods and examines the contribution that the EU budget could make to meeting the EU's most pressing expenditure needs with more performance-based funding. It provides a comprehensive reflection on how the EU budgetary system should evolve to support a more capable and effective Union. According to its analysis, maximising this efficiency requires transforming the EU budget in at least four ways: • Changing the composition of the EU budget to focus on Union public goods, moving away from expenditure that could also be carried out efficiently at national level; proposing to concentrate the MFF on the delivery of EPG, such as climate action, research, competitiveness, crossborder infrastructure and security; • Increasing the size of the MFF to finance and structure public investment and expenditure that benefits the EU as a whole: innovation, ecological and digital transition, cross-border infrastructure, EU partnerships and external economic policy (including international climate action); • Changing the composition of revenue, which will no longer consist of contributions from Member States based on national income and will become revenues linked to common EU competences or policy objectives in areas such as trade, climate and defence; • Strengthening the framework that guarantees the quality of EU expenditure channelled through national or local authorities, based on the experience of the Recovery and Resilience Facility. They recommend aligning the CAP performance framework with the general EU framework by introducing mandatory performance indicators in all national plans focused on reducing emissions and preventing environmental and biodiversity degradation. According to the analysis carried out, to increase its added value, the next seven-year EU budget for 2028 to 2034 should be strategically oriented, better funded and more effective, with a strengthened performance framework, while managing the budgetary impact of future EU enlargements.
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