Shorten EU budget to 3 or 4 years, Cyprus president tells POLITICO

Nikos Christodoulides, the president of Cyprus, suggests that the EU should consider adopting a shorter budget cycle of either three or four years. This idea was brought up during an interview with POLITICO, while discussing the EU summit held in Brussels. The Cypriot president pointed out that the EU is currently discussing budgets for the year 2034, while they are in the year 2026.

He believes that a shorter budget could be more manageable for some member countries and suggested opening a political discussion on the matter.

Christodoulides acknowledges that it is impossible to predict the situation in a few years, citing the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine as examples. These unforeseen events make it difficult to declare all priorities at the current time. The EU's current budget, which is roughly €2 trillion, is set to be decided by all 27 member countries.

However, there are two strong factions in the negotiations: the frugal group, consisting of Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden, who advocate for a smaller budget, and the friends of cohesion, a coalition of 17 countries that oppose significant cuts to agricultural and regional funds.

An EU official noted that the idea of a shorter timeframe is unusual, as EU law only permits a minimum budget period of five years, with all budgets being seven years since 1993. With the odds of reaching a political agreement by the end of the year dwindling due to the Spanish election in November, it is becoming less likely that the budget will be finalized by then.

Christodoulides also expects that the budget will be reduced by approximately one-tenth compared to the initial proposal from the European Commission, potentially leading to a cut of around 10% or 11%.