The EU budget and the sustainable development goals

In Bulgaria, the European Social Fund Plus supports a project modernising social protection systems, with the goal of improving access for vulnerable groups, including children and people with disabilities. By enhancing the capacity of staff, the Agency of Social Assistance will ensure adequate care by offering those in need competent and multi-component support, in line with new technologies and ensuring an improvement in their quality of life. This initiative ensures faster, more efficient support, helping prevent social isolation and improve quality of life.

The single market programme supports initiatives such as emergency measures for animal and plant disease control, EU Reference Laboratories and the EU vaccine bank for animal diseases, directly reduce risks to food security by ensuring sustainable agricultural production and resilience against outbreaks of diseases like African swine fever, avian influenza, foot-and-mouth disease, lumpy skin disease, peste des petits ruminants and sheep pox and goat pox.

The programme supports the European Food Bank Federation’s activities to facilitate food donation and increase the share of surplus food made available for human consumption, thereby addressing both food security and preventing food waste. The annual grant helps increase the federation’s capacity to redistribute food

The EU4Health programme and its annual work programmes deliver actions to implement the ‘Healthier together’ initiative, Europe’s beating cancer plan, the comprehensive approach to mental health, and addresses key risk factors to reduce premature mortality from non-communicable diseases. The programme also funds actions that are producing guidance to improve healthcare access contributing to SDG 3.8, while also funding actions to address SDG 3.3 to end the epidemics of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, neglected tropical diseases and combat hepatitis, water-borne diseases and other communicable diseases. The programme funds actions to strengthen the capacity of countries for early warning, risk reduction and management of national and global health risks, addressing SDG 3.D.

Financed by Erasmus+, the share the music for inclusive learning in education project was designed to support teachers in addressing this challenge by providing a practical framework andshowcasing best practices for managing inclusion and diversity in education. Its primary goal is to offer pre-primary and primary schoolteachers new knowledge, key competencies and ready-to-use educational materials to effectively use music as a pedagogical tool for inclusive education.

Additionally, the project aims to help teachers develop their social and digital skills through its digital repository and online training resources. While the project has been designed for teachers, the ultimate beneficiaries are the students, whose well-being and academic performance are expected to improve as a result of these integrated inclusive practices.

Under the Technical Support Instrument in 2025, a number of new gender-related projects started recently. For instance, the Technical Support Instrument project on the assessment on the effectiveness of work–life balance and gender equality policies in the labour market is helping Portugal to address its demographic challenges and promote a more inclusive and equitable society, contributing to the country’s sustainable economic development and competitiveness.

The EU provides safe drinking water, sanitation and hygiene support through its humanitarian aid operations and the Union Civil Protection Mechanism, whose main objective is to save and preserve life and alleviate the suffering of populations facing severe environmental health risks and water insecurity in the context of anticipated, ongoing and recent humanitarian crises, for example in Ukraine. The mechanism has also been active in responding to flooded areas with non-food items, health and water access and sanitation and hygiene material, such as in the response to Hurricane Melissa in the Caribbean (Cuba, Jamaica) and in earthquake-affected areas such as Myanmar. These donations were offered by Member States, and the Emergency Response Coordination Centre co-funded transport and deployment costs.

Through Horizon Europe, the ascend project, with an EU contribution of EUR 19.99 million, supports affordable and clean energy in cities by delivering two Positive Clean Energy Districts in Lyon and Munich and engaging eight partner cities to prepare replication. The project develops and disseminates scalable, cost-effective district-level energy solutions to accelerate urban energy transitions.

Under the Instrument for Pre-accession Assistance, the regional project ‘Supporting the development of a modern payment system and a regional investment area in the Western Balkans’, implemented by the World Bank, supports the Western Balkan partners to join the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA). In 2025 North Macedonia and Serbia joined SEPA’s geographical scope, after Albania and Montenegro who had already joined at the end of 2024. Moreover, as of October 2025, Albania, Montenegro and North Macedonia started enjoying SEPA’s concrete benefits by joining its payment schemes. This resulted in faster transactions and in a reduction of transaction costs by up to ten times. It is estimated that SEPA’s full implementation in the Western Balkan region could potentially save up to EUR 500 million per year for individuals and businesses.

Digital Europe is contributing to the broader digital transformation of areas of public interest and of industry. The acquisition and deployment of advanced supercomputing capabilities aim to enhance Europe’s industrial competitiveness. Moreover, the established network of European Digital Innovation Hubs contributes to the digitisation of industry and addresses issues of technological accessibility, ensuring that businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises, have access to cutting-edge technologies and finance for adapting to digital change. The interoperable Europe action supports the development of reusable interoperability infrastructure/solutions, with the view to support the digital transformation of the public sector and create capacity for public authorities to collaborate effectively to set up seamless cross-border services.

Under the Asylum Migration and Integration Fund, phase 7 of the regional development and protection programme for North Africa is running from 2025 to 2028 with a budget (EU grant amount maximum) of EUR 37.5 million. The main objective of the proposed action is to support non-EU countries in North Africa and across the Atlantic and Mediterranean migration route to consolidate their migration and asylum systems and build their capacity to provide adequate reception, protection and durable solutions for vulnerable migrants, asylum seekers and refugees.

Under Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument – Global Europe, in 2025 the EU launched, the third phase of its flagship initiative Mayors for Economic Growth (2025-2028, EUR 8 million), implemented by the United Nations Development Programme, reinforcing its support for local economic development across the Eastern Partnership since 2017. This new phase empowers cities and towns in Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine to tackle challenges such as rural depopulation, job creation, climate change, and the digital transition, with a strengthened focus on local economic development planning and access to finance. In 2025 alone, the initiative unlocked approximately EUR 1 million to support local governments in leading their own economic transformation.

By the end of 2025, the Recovery and Resilience Facility supported the installation of photovoltaic capacity in business premises in Luxembourg.

The Innovation Fund is designed to answer this goal and take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts. The grip project aims to decarbonise industrial heat production up to 200 °C by scaling up the industrialisation of the innovative rotation heat pump technology. Project endor aims at producing electric sustainable aviation fuel to support the decarbonisation of the aviation sector.

Regional fisheries management organisations promote the conservation and sustainable use of the oceans, seas and marine resources by improving management measures adopted following scientific advice and by promoting healthy tuna stocks in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans, and through the governance framework established by sustainable fisheries partnership agreements with a number of non-EU countries.

The European Regional Development Fund planned EUR 9.5 billion to support this goal. For instance, the urban biodiversity parks project in Turku (Finland) reflects the New European Bauhaus principles by promoting urban ecological restoration and regeneration through the creation of biodiversity parks and pilot green spaces. It reflects Turku’s ambition to become one of the world’s leading ‘nature and climate cities’. The project aim is to establish a 20-hectare biodiversity park, providing a recreational area – while also serving as a platform for community engagement and experiential learning. The concept is being piloted in Turku’s Skanssi area, with more, smaller pilots planned in other suburban neighbourhoods. 

The common foreign and security policy measures contribute to the preservation of peace, conflict prevention, strengthening of international security, consolidating and supporting democracy, the rule of law and human rights by advising and building capacity on security sector reforms, the rule of law and border management, by supporting mediation and conflict resolution initiatives or by supporting the universalisation and effective implementation of international treaties and conventions addressing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction or conventional weapons.