Data for research

DG Regional Policy actively encourages research and the use of data on the ESIF and Structural Funds. Below we indicate some of the data available across different programming periods. Increasingly, this data is made available on the ESIF Open Data Platform in the data catalogue: https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/browse . There you will find metadata pages and link to graphs giving insights into the dataset contents.

The DG REGIO evaluation unit welcomes feedback and will try to respond promptly to requests. Should you need data that is not in the catalogue, or should you require additional explanations (beyond what is in the metadata) please contact us.

1. European Structural and Investment Funds 2014-2020

Datasets available on the ESIF Open Data platform (with metadata files) - https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/browse

2. Historic data on Structural Funds by Member state

    a. Data on EU Payments

  • This dataset (first published March 2018) provides historic long-term regionalised (NUTS-2) annual EU expenditure data for different EU funds - ERDF, Cohesion Fund, EAFRD/EAGGF and ESF. It is the most complete dataset of it kind covering 4 programming periods, however, it does not contain thematic information. Historic EU payments - regionalised and modelled
  • Geography of expenditure study, August 2015 (Ex post 2007-2013): More information
    • Database of the cumulative allocations to selected projects and expenditure at NUTS3 level broken down by the 86 priority themes EN xls
    • Database of the cumulative allocations to selected projects and expenditure at NUTS2 EN xls
    • Integrated database of allocations and expenditure for 2000-2006/2007–2013 EN xls
  • Regional expenditure study 2000-2006: Breakdown of ERDF, Cohesion Fund and ISPA expenditures by regions, by sectors and by Objectives. The report gives an overview of the results and the methodological issues, the complete data is contained in the annexes - Final Report pdf
    • Annex 1 Breakdown by NUTS2 level regions and fundamental expenditure categories xls
    • Annex 2 Breakdown by NUTS3 level regions and sectors xls
    • 1994 - 1999

    • b. Data on budget commitments

  • EU Budget commitments by fund by year and by programme

3. Period 2007-2013

For the programming period 2007-2013, progress in implementation was reported by the managing authorities in the programme annual implementation reports (AIR). This led to the capture of monitoring information on (1) allocations decided and how they changed over time, (2) amounts allocated to projects (project selection) and (3) information on ERDF and Cohesion Fund achievements as measured by the use of core indicators (common EU indicators).

4. Lists of beneficiaries

Since 2007, there is a legal obligation on Member States to provide information on the beneficiaries of Cohesion Policy.

5. Major Projects (ERDF/Cohesion fund)

6. ERDF/CF/ESF expenditure "Categorisation system" - background documentation

Evaluation