<h6><strong>The Diplomat</strong></h6> <h4><strong>The Council of Ministers approved this Tuesday the Royal Decree regulating subsidies and aid in the field of cooperation for sustainable development.</strong></h4> “Today, in the Council of Ministers, we approved another milestone to complete the ambitious reform of Spanish Cooperation: the new Royal Decree on subsidies,” declared the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, through social networks. This reform, he continued, “will improve agility, impact and accountability and will reduce bureaucracy at a time when cooperation is more necessary than ever.” The purpose of the rule, according to the Council of Ministers, is to regulate the specific legal regime of subsidies and aid in the field of cooperation for sustainable development granted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, EU and Cooperation and by the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID). The main objectives of the Royal Decree are to adapt the regulation of these subsidies and aid to the current context of international cooperation for development and to ensure the efficiency and simplification of procedures, adapting bureaucratic processes to the specificities of cooperation for sustainable development and reducing administrative burdens as much as possible. In addition, the new regulation aims to incorporate the new features introduced by the Law on Cooperation for Sustainable Development and Global Solidarity of 2023 and to expand the scope of matters potentially subject to specific regulation in the field of subsidies and aid that are the development of the Government's foreign policy. According to a press release from the AECID on Tuesday, the Royal Decree is part of the process of reform of Spanish Cooperation that is based on the new Cooperation Law and "responds to its objectives of modernizing cooperation instruments, making them more agile and flexible to adapt them to present and future needs and strengthening transparency, accountability and impact on development projects." “Its preparation has been carried out based on a prior analysis of the specific needs of development cooperation and in a participatory manner,” it continued. In this process, he added, staff from the different AECID units and other affected bodies and entities, such as decentralised cooperation or civil society, have been involved. With this reform, “an improved and stable regulatory framework is created, consistent with the national and European Union legal system, which adapts the regulation of subsidies and aid to the specificities of the cooperation context,” says the AECID. The standard includes the key role of the autonomous communities and local entities in Spanish cooperation and is applicable to all administrations in the field of cooperation subsidies and aid. “This aspect will allow for greater harmonisation in the calls for subsidies in this area, which will favour their better application, both from the point of view of the administration and of the entities that benefit from the subsidies and aid,” says the agency.
