PO SEUR - Operational Programme for Sustainability and Efficient Use of Resources, established through an Execution Decision from the European Commission on December 16, 2014 and is one of the 16 programmes created for the operationalization of Portugal 2020 Strategy (a partnership agreement established between Portugal and the European Commission that gathers the action of 5 European Structural and Investment Funds - ESIF, Cohesion Fund, ESF, EAFRD and EMFF - in which the programming principles are laid down and mark the economic, social and territorial development policy to be promoted in Portugal between 2014 and 2020).
Within this scope, Portugal shall be awarded 25 thousand million euros until 2020 and for this Thematic Goals were defined to stimulate growth and the creation of Employment, the necessary interventions to execute them and the undertakings and outputs expected as a result of these funding.
PO SEUR - Operational Programme for Sustainability and Efficient Use of Resources wishes to specifically contribute to the sustainable growth priority, addressing the transitional challenges to a low carbon economy based on a more efficient use of resources and on the promotion of greater resilience to climate risks and catastrophes.
Portugal is seeking a sustainable growth trajectory based on a more competitive and resilient model of development with a lower consumption of natural and energy resources and that simultaneously generates new opportunities of employment, wealth and knowledge reinforcement. The programme for 2014-2020 aims for Europe to anticipate and adapt to the great global changes in the field of energy, climate change and more efficient use of resources alongside a dynamic perspective that links competitiveness to sustainability. Portugal is deeply committed to the structural transformation of its model of development, thus trying to create conditions for a greater cohesion and convergence within the European context.
PO SEUR is tributary to part of the Territorial Valorisation Agenda developed between 2007-2013 which was partially funded by the Structural and Cohesion Funds and gained wider coverage with the integration of the energy dimension, in terms of efficiency, renewable energies and security of supply as the preferred mechanism for the fulfilment of the public policies of the sector.
The strategy foreseen for PO SEUR refers a multidimensional perspective of sustainability based on three strategic pillars which are the root of the 3 Programme Investment Axes:
Portugal has conditions and opportunities within the green economy area that must be explored to generate more wealth and employment. The country is deeply committed to promoting green economy by means of different mechanisms (tax incentives, regulatory, investments), thus stimulating the public and private sectors to intervene more in the area being that the investments foreseen in the areas covered by PO SEUR shall generate important opportunities for different sectors and activities in terms of revenues and employment.
