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Roundup: Lithuania opts for administrative-territorial reform

Xinhua, May 12, 2015 Adjust font size:

Lithuania plans to implement administrative-territorial reform which would ensure that the Baltic country does not lose 2.7 billion euros (3.01 billion U.S. dollars) in European Union (EU) support, Lithuanian government announced Monday.

"These decisions are necessary in order to get prepared to the situation when Lithuania will exceed 75 percent of the EU's average GDP and thus will not be able to receive the EU's support as a less developed region," the cabinet explained in a statement.

According to the country's interior minister Saulius Skvernelis, Lithuania will likely exceed this margin after statistical data from 2014 is announced, ELTA news agency reported.

"Without any changes, in the EU's 2021-2028 financial framework Lithuania would be assigned to the group of transitional regions, which would mean 2.7 billion euro less regional support from the EU," ELTA quoted Skvernelis as saying.

In words of the minister, it is Vilnius and its suburbs that are raising the country's GDP, while situation in less developed areas of Lithuania is quite different.

In the essence of planned reforms, boundaries of a few Lithuanian territorial districts would be changed, in order to assign less developed municipalities to the neighboring district.

The reforms would not have any impact on the residents or administrative breakdown of the country and no new public institutions would be created, the government stressed.

"This is about statistical data collection," Skvernelis noted.

The reform would match the EU's regional policy which is aimed to improve the economic well-being of different regions in the EU and also to avoid regional disparities.

Regions across the EU fall into different categories, depending mostly on their economic situation. In the current 2014-2020 funding period, money is allocated differently between regions that are deemed to be "more developed" (with per capita GDP over 90 percent of the EU average), "transition" (between 75 percent and 90 percent), and "less developed" (less than 75 percent).

There are 60 municipalities in Lithuania, which belong to 10 larger administrative districts. Endit