MIL-OSI Europe: Answer to a written question – ‘Demographic change in Europe: a toolbox for action’ – support for rural areas – E-000217/2025(ASW)

The Commission adopted on 27 March 2024 its report on the long-term vision for EU’s rural areas. Key achievements to date include: the rural revitalisation platform[1], the rural energy community advisory hub[2], the EU Rural Observatory[3], the Startup Village Forum platform[4] and the Rural toolkit[5], in addition to a number of concrete projects[6].

In June 2024, the Commission designated 146 regions as Regional Innovation Valleys under the New European Innovation Agenda as a recognition to their commitment.

The EU backed this initiative with EUR 116 million through the European Innovation Ecosystems (EIE) part of Horizon Europe and the Interregional Innovation Investments (I3) Instrument of the European Regional Development Fund.

The I3 project implementation usually takes two to three years and cover a variety of technological and economic sectors relevant for the twin transition[7]. The EIE project implementation takes three to five years.

Approximately 30 calls were launched under the Horizon Europe programme[8] between 2021 and 2024 for proposals with a direct impact on rural areas in three clusters (cluster 2 ‘Culture, creativity and inclusive society’, cluster 5 ‘Climate, energy and mobility’, cluster 6 ‘Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, agriculture and environment’).

The 60 projects selected under the calls have a budget of EUR 253 million available for rural areas.

• [1] https://ruralpact.rural-vision.europa.eu/rural-revitalisation_en
• [2] https://rural-energy-community-hub.ec.europa.eu/index_en
• [3] https://observatory.rural-vision.europa.eu/
• [4] https://startup-forum.rural-vision.europa.eu/?lng=en
• [5] https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_656
• [6] E.g. 2025 Commission report on policy implications of demographic trends in the EU’s rural regions: https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC140514
• [7] EU Funded projects: https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/portal/screen/opportunities/projects-results;programCode=I3?order=DESC&pageNumber=1&pageSize=50&sortBy=title&isExactMatch=true&frameworkProgramme=44416173
• [8] https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe_en