(*) Key achievements in the table state which period they relate to. Some come from the implementation of the predecessor programmes under the 2014-2020 multiannual financial framework. This is expected and is due to the multiannual life cycle of EU programmes and the projects they finance, where results often follow only after completion of the programmes.
Budget for 2021-2027
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Rationale and design of the programme
Creative Europe is the European Commission’s programme for dedicated support to the cultural and audiovisual sectors. Creative Europe was established in 2014 to integrate three separate programmes, namely Culture, MEDIA and Media Mundus. Since 2014 the programme has three strands:
- Culture, covering cultural and creative sectors except audiovisual and news media;
- MEDIA, covering audiovisual including cinema, TV, video games, immersive content;
- Cross-sectoral, covering actions across audiovisual and other cultural sectors, plus, since 2021, support to news media and media freedom.
As per the current legal base, the allocation of budget between the different strands of the programme is the following 58% for MEDIA, 33% for Culture and 9% for Cross-sectoral.
Cultural and linguistic diversity is a pillar of the European identity and values. European cultural and creative sectors greatly contribute to jobs and growth, and have positive spillover effects on other sectors. Thus the programme fully recognises the dual nature of these sectors.
Over the years the programme has evolved to address the challenges facing the cultural and creative sectors. These sectors face increasing challenges from ongoing digital transformation and unprecedented global competition for audiences, whereas their potential remains unduly constrained by market fragmentation along national lines. Action at the EU level is needed to overcome such fragmentation and brings great benefits by fostering transnational artistic creation, cross-border circulation of content and the mobility of professionals and creators; by incentivising innovation in content, tools and business models; by facilitating the pooling of knowledge and accelerated learning; and by scaling up to be more competitive in the single market.
Moreover, the aftermaths of the COVID-19 pandemic and the illegal invasion of Ukraine by Russia in 2022 which led to inflation exacerbated the difficulties met by the cultural and creative sectors. Price inflation, coupled with an escalation in production budgets, has led to gaps in financing for organisations and increased the average budget of cultural and audiovisual EU productions. Nonetheless, creative organisations and companies have a potential for high growth, despite their size and often being small organisations or self-entrepreneurs susceptible to precariousness. Ensuring continuous upskilling of the professionals of the sector will be key to competitiveness, notably through entrepreneurial and cross-cutting skills to encourage transformation and innovation.
More specifically news media have been encountering a growing number of media freedom threats all across Europe, and revenues of media outlets are on the decrease, with difficulties in securing sustainable business models. This weakens the media’s capacity to safeguard democracy.
In a policy field of shared competence, Creative Europe funding complements the funding provided by the Member States.
The EU added value shall be ensured through:
- the transnational character of actions and activities;
- cross-border cooperation and the potential of such cooperation to address common challenges;
- the economies of scale and growth and jobs which EU support fosters, creating a leverage effect;
- providing a more level playing field through actions with European added value under the MEDIA strand that take into account the specificities of different countries.
Creative Europe’s specific objectives are:
- to safeguard, develop and promote European cultural and linguistic diversity and heritage; and
- to increase the competitiveness and economic potential of the cultural and creative sectors, in particular the audiovisual sector.
More specifically, it aims to:
- enhance artistic and cultural cooperation at the European level in order to support the creation of European works and strengthen the economic, social and external dimension of and innovation and mobility in Europe’s cultural and creative sectors;
- promote the competitiveness, scalability, cooperation, innovation and sustainability, including through mobility, of the European audiovisual industry;
- promote policy cooperation and innovative actions supporting all strands of the Programme and to promote a diverse, independent and pluralistic media environment, and media literacy, thereby fostering freedom of artistic expression, intercultural dialogue and social inclusion.
Under the culture strand, the programme focuses on cooperative artistic projects, platforms and networks to share and promote works and opportunities. It also focuses on internationalisation through the mobility of people and through transnational activities with cultural and creative organisations.
Under the MEDIA strand, the programme focuses on the development and production of high quality and innovative audiovisual content; the strengthening of audiovisual businesses through training, professional markets and networks, support to distribution companies, funding innovative tools and business models; reaching wider audiences through the cross-border distribution and promotion of non-national European works, supporting festivals and a network of European cinemas, and the development of transnational networks and audiences. Cooperation with the European Audiovisual Observatory, the European Media Freedom Board and support to the Audiovisual Media Services Directive are also funded.
Under the cross-sectoral strand, the programme supports policy cooperation, innovation across the cultural and creative sectors, media pluralism, media literacy, cross-border collaborative journalism and standards, and the activities of programme desks.
The programme is managed by the Commission (jointly by DG Education, Youth, Sport and Culture and DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology), with implementation mostly delegated to the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (publication of calls, evaluation of applications, contracting and financial execution and monitoring of projects).
DG Education, Youth, Sport and Culture and DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology steer the programme through annual work programmes. The document gives an indication of the amount allocated to each action and sets out, where applicable, the overall amount reserved for blending operations. The Directorates-General also monitor and regularly evaluate the programme and supervise the Executive Agency. DG Education, Youth, Sport and Culture is responsible for the Culture strand and DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology for the MEDIA strand. The Cross-sectoral strand is jointly managed.
In accordance with the annual work programmes, the European Education and Culture Executive Agency publishes calls for proposals for projects, ensures their selection and funding and monitors project implementation. Each funded project must contribute to the goals set out by Creative Europe’s legal basis.
However DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology manages blending operations in favour of the Media Invest equity platform, under InvestEU as well as a Contribution Agreement with the Council of Europe, on behalf of the European Audiovisual Observatory, and the programme’s support to the audiovisual media regulators and newly established Media Freedom Board.
To support the implementation of the programme, the Creative Europe desks, which are financed partly by the programme, serve as local contact points and advise potentially candidates applicants for funding.
The programme aims to build on the creative Europe programme’s 2014-2020 achievements (e.g. it delivered on the strategic EU priorities such as the Europe 2020 employment targets) and scale-up efforts.
Programme website:
Impact assessment:
- The impact assessment of the creative Europe programme was carried out in 2018;
- For further information please consult: SWD/2018/290 final - 2018/0207 (COD)
Relevant regulation:
Evaluations:
- Monitoring report 2021-2022 in preparation in 2023 for a planned delivery in June. Final evaluation of the 2014-2020 programme and midterm evaluation of the current programme has been launched with results expected to be published in December 2024.
- An own-initiative report on the implementation of the 2021-2027 creative Europe programme by the European Parliament (rapporteur Massimiliano Smeriglio) was published in December 2023 and adopted on 16 January 2024.
- European Media Industry Outlook – published in May 2023.
- Study on the level playing field in the audiovisual industry – works were ongoing in 2023, to be finalised in 2024. Greening of the creative Europe programme, published in May 2023
Budget
Budget programming (million EUR):
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Financial programming:
+ EUR 16.0 million (+ 1%)
compared to the legal basis*
* Top-ups pursuant to Article 5 of the multiannual financial framework regulation are excluded from financial programming in this comparison.
- The overall budget has been frontloaded, with a third of the creative Europe budget to be committed in the first 2 years of the programme, in order to address the difficult situation of the sector hardly hit by the COVID-19 crisis. In 2022, the creative Europe programme benefited from an overall increase close to EUR 100 million compared to 2021, representing a budget increase of 33% compared to the previous year. Following the financial programming profile, the annual budget for creative Europe returns in 2023 to the regular profile and have a steady but low growth until the end of the programme cycle.
- The difference of budget between the financial programming and the legal basis (EUR 13 million) is due to the additional budget voted in 2022 and 2023 by the budget authority (EUR 5.5 million in 2022 and EUR 7.5 million in 2023).
- The 2024 creative Europe budget was reinforced by EUR 3 million (EUR 2 million for the culture strand; EUR 1 million for the cross-sectoral strand for news-media-targeted actions) following the conciliation phase between the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union in November 2023.
Budget performance – implementation
Cumulative implementation rate at the end of 2023 (million EUR):
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Voted budget implementation (million EUR)(*):
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- Following the delays in the implementation of the creative Europe programme in 2021 and 2022 due to the late adoption of the new programme and the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, 2023 was the year in which the programme reached its regular cruising speed as regards to the budget implementation.
- The measures taken at the beginning of the programme to support the cultural and creative sectors against the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic continued to be implemented in the supported projects, such as the high-financing rates. As the sanitary situation significantly improved, the decision was taken to reinstate all in-person meetings with the programme stakeholders in 2023.
- In 2023, through a robust budget approach characterised by prudence, adaptability and strategic foresight, DG Education, Youth, Sport and Culture, and DG Communications Networks, Content and Technology together with the European Education and Culture Executive Agency, managed to close the year with outstanding budgetary performance in EU budget for creative Europe, reaching 100%.
- Creative Europe continues at cruising speed for the publication of its calls, with the Annual Work programme 2024 in September 2023 and the majority of its calls published in the autumn.
- In 2023, the budget was reinforced by EUR 7.5 million, reaching a total budget of EUR 332 790 321, divided as follows: culture strand: EUR 102 685 229 (+ EUR 2.5 million); MEDIA: EUR 180 661 827 (+ EUR 5 million); cross-sectoral: EUR 26 981 060. This budget is a sharp decrease in comparison to the year prior (EUR 406 527 982) as the programme budget had been frontloaded in 2022 to tackle the immediate consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. This peak of budget allowed for the launch of new actions, such as the ‘Culture moves Europe’ mobility scheme and MediaInvest, or to reach record numbers of funded projects (168 European Cooperation Projects, the highest number ever reached).
- In the next three years the budget of the programme will increase annually by 5%, 2% and 26% on an annual basis, taking into account the Article 5 revision.
- The factor influencing all sectors is the higher-than-expected inflation rates, which raised the costs of all funded projects. Another development that accentuated the needs of the cultural and creative sectors, in line with the goals of the programme but not provided for in the budget scale in 2018, is the advent of AI solutions to creative activities and the broader uptake of virtual/augmented reality. These two technological innovations are very costly to be adopted and exploited by the cultural and creative sectors, starting from learning the right skills in using these technologies, from production to distribution as well as transforming business models. The growth of global platforms, which heavily invest in AI, increases the investments needed to be competitive.
- Therefore, the programme’s budget implementation 2024, and the 2025 budget preparation exercise will be running in an exceptionally challenging context.
- Additionally, as regards MEDIA strand, private investments in audiovisual production at first increased the average budget of a production in the VOD-platform boom of the years before the COVID-19 lockdowns. Then in 2023, there were several decisions by the largest private investors to cut down on production expenses, which does not result in lowering the average budgets, but limiting the number of productions, endangering some jobs in the sector.
- The culture strand sees an ever-increasing number of applications to its actions, and in particular the European Cooperation Projects for which the number of applications submitted rose from 468 proposals in 2021 to 831 in 2023 – a 78% increase. As the budget for this action is rather stable (around 60% of the culture strand budget), this high number of submitted projects impacts the success rate of this action which fell from 26% in 2021 to 17% in the 2023 call.
- In the cross-sectoral strand the creative innovation labs have responded to new priorities such as building virtual worlds (in line with the communication of July 2023 on metaverses). Also the calls on journalism launched in 2021 have been very successful and highly oversubscribed. This reflects how the news media sector suffers from decreasing revenues from advertising and sales, as reported in the European Media Industry Outlook. Additionally, the cross-sectoral strand is expected to onboard two activities in 2025 which were not envisaged in the multiannual financial framework: the Board of European Media Freedom (under the EMFA, agreed in 2023, and the European Digital Media Observatory (central structure).
Contribution to horizontal priorities
Green budgeting
Contribution to green budgeting priorities (million EUR):
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- In the 2021-2027 programme, ecological concerns are taken into account in the design and implementation of all funded projects, as a cross-cutting issue, in order to reduce their impact on the environment.
- The European Commission published a study on the greening of the creative Europe programme in May 2023, with the objective of enhancing good environmental practices among the programme stakeholders within the framework of the European Green Deal. The study highlighted the willingness of the sector to engage with greening initiatives and will serve as a guide for the years to come. A network of greening contact points among the creative Europe desks (culture strand only) was set up in 2023, and several workshops were organised to build their capacities in this domain.
- The programme does not directly support climate mitigation initiatives; however, environmental sustainability remains one of the priorities of the programme and is referred to in all of its calls.
- The culture strand of the programme continues to co-fund projects encouraging the sector to adopt more environmentally friendly practices and business models. Applicants to the calls for cooperation projects are requested to submit a greening strategy. Furthermore, collaborative efforts within the MEDIA strand are ongoing to set standards for calculating and reducing carbon dioxide emissions within the audiovisual production chain.
- MEDIA and cross-sectoral strands: almost all proposals submitted within the MEDIA strand are requested to provide a strategy to improve the greening of the industry (except for two actions where this is not applicable). Changes implemented in the markets and networks action and the MEDIA 360° action meant that supported events had to start the process of obtaining sustainability certification. This will apply to 49 supported events per year. A focus on greening was also proposed in the talent and skills action, in order to improve greening skills within the audiovisual industry. The results were positive, with additional training funded on greening and sustainability.
- In 2023, the Commission produced a European carbon calculator for audiovisual productions to standardise and compare measurements used across the Member States This tool, which should be delivered in 2025, aims to combine a calculation methodology using data harmonised at the European level together with a web application. It shall be free for use to audiovisual producers in all Member States and will be complement existing national calculators through a ‘plug in’ approach. As the project progresses, there will be regular outreach activities with producers, calculators and stakeholders.
- The programme will step up its action in the years to come to support climate mitigation in the design of its annual work programmes.
- The yearly contribution to climate objectives is based on beneficiary organisations’ applications for funding for projects with climate-related topics.
Gender
Contribution to gender equality (million EUR) (*):
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| Gender disaggregated information: |
|---|
In MEDIA-funded schemes, women accounted for 40% of the directors and 43% of the screenwriters of films supported in 2023 at the distribution, development or production stages. These numbers are far above the market average. These levels are similar to the 2022 results. Creative Europe specific objective 1, indicator 2: number of artists & cultural &/or creative players (geographically) mobile beyond national borders due to programme support, by country of origin (including the proportion of women). In 2023, the initial results indicated that 53% of the grantees that had transnational mobility through the programme were women. However, the data is purely indicative and should be read with a disclaimer. The result is based on the data provided for 2021 and 2022 from the continuous reporting in eGrants for projects funded under the COOP, LIT, NET, PLAT and PECE calls. The are allocated to the work programme year under which the call was published (there is no data source that would allow allocation of people to the year in which the mobility took place). These data are provisional and indicative at the time of reporting for the following two reasons.
The data obtained for ‘Culture moves Europe’ are provisional and report on the first round of implementation of the action (from October 2022 to the end of May 2023). It should be noted that participants in the mobility schemes are not obliged to report their gender. The first data on gender were extracted from ‘Culture moves Europe’ results only. Both sets of data have been aggregated to give the number provided in the programme performance statement. |
- Under the creative Europe programme, special attention is given to applications presenting adequate strategies to ensure gender balance, which was introduced as a cross-cutting priority in all strands of the programme starting with the 2021 annual work programme.
- The culture strand of the creative Europe programme is anchored in policy development and EU policy cooperation in the field of culture, notably in line with the objectives of the 2018 new European agenda for culture and the 2019-2022 Council work plan for culture. As such, the programme mainstreams the cross-cutting issues of inclusion and diversity through its actions and supports the 2020-2025 gender equality strategy. Special attention is paid to applications presenting adequate strategies to ensure gender balance and a more sustainable and environmentally respectful industry, along with inclusion, diversity and representativeness. A significant number of projects already aim to strengthen gender equality in cultural and creative projects, including mentorship projects, sector-specific evaluations, etc. These projects appear in the yearly creative Europe monitoring report, and their results can be further shared through our supported networks. In addition, beyond this requirement that is applicable to all creative Europe projects, the cooperation scheme includes an explicit inclusiveness priority to encourage projects to focus their objectives and activities on gender issues to explore, test and disseminate innovative gender equality practices.
- Media and cross-sectoral strands: the 2021-2027 strategy for the audiovisual sector envisages further policy development by including gender activities in all EU actions that concern the audiovisual sector. The focus of the strategy has moved from gender alone to the broader concept of diversity. Since 2021, the MEDIA strand has encouraged companies to include gender and inclusiveness strategies in their businesses, and the 2021-2022 evaluations show that almost all applicants are making use of this opportunity to increase the value of their projects and hence contribute to achieving gender balance. Creative Europe applicants are requested to show the action taken in their companies in support of diversity and gender equality. Also, for the first time, in 2022, the training scheme included a module targeting women, based on capacity building and mentoring opportunities.
- Regarding interventions the principal objective of which is to improve gender equality (score 2), the total yearly contribution to gender is based on beneficiary organisations’ applications for funding for projects with gender-related topics.
- Regarding interventions with a likely but not yet clear impact on gender equality (score 0*), the total yearly contribution to gender is the difference between the programme’s budget as indicated in the relevant annual work programme and the yearly contribution to gender based on beneficiary organisations’ applications for funding for projects with gender-related topics.
- Final data will be available upon the completion of projects (normally 2 to 3 years after the start).
Digital
Contribution to digital transition (million EUR):
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- The legal basis states that creative Europe should contribute to the digital shift of the cultural and creative sectors.
- In the cooperation projects under the culture strand, the digital priority to help the European cultural and creative sectors to undertake or accelerate their digital transition is included as the first or second priority in the project application. Moreover, creative Europe networks also have the objective of helping the European cultural and creative sectors to fully take advantage of new technologies to enhance their competitiveness.
- In line with the media and audiovisual action plan, the MEDIA and cross-sectoral strands have prioritised support for the digitisation of the audiovisual and news media industries.
- Under the MEDIA strand, a number of existing schemes have integrated a strong digital dimension. The talent and skills scheme includes as a priority the strengthening of the capacity of audiovisual professionals to embrace the digital transition. Support is also given to television and online content to facilitate European and international co-productions for exploitation by both digital platforms and TV broadcasters. Also, European video-on-demand networks are supported in their efforts to screen a significant proportion of European works. Both the theatrical and the online distribution of films are funded through the MEDIA strand. Support for film markets and festivals has been adapted to provide assistance to hybrid events online.
- Also, since 2021, new schemes have been established to deepen support for digitisation. The innovative tools and business models scheme supports the promotion and marketing of tools, including online and through the use of data analytics, to increase the reach of European works. The video games and immersive content scheme is dedicated to supporting the development of digital content, including for virtual worlds. Furthermore, a virtual reality / augmented reality industry coalition was established to stimulate cooperation across industry sectors and ensure European leadership.
- Under the cross-sectoral strand, the creative innovation labs encourage innovative approaches to content creation and distribution, taking into account the opportunities of the digital transition, notably virtual worlds. Also, support for news media collaborations has been introduced to address structural challenges, including digitisation, to the production and monetisation of quality journalism.
- The yearly contribution to digital objectives is based on beneficiary organisations’ applications for funding for projects with digital-related topics. Data are provisional, as the final results will only be available upon the completion of projects (normally 2 to 3 years after the start).
Budget performance – outcomes
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Link to file with complete set of EU core performance indicators
- When it comes to contribution to horizontal priorities, information is not yet available for 2023. The 2021-2022 results show that EUR 260 million was dedicated to projects contributing to greening, EUR 162 million contributed to digital transformation and EUR 674 million was dedicated to achieving gender equality (including EUR 38 million of projects that had gender equality as their principal objective). This means that gender priority was present in over 97% of the value of the support. Also, 23% of projects counted by value contribute to the digital transformation and 37% to greening.
- 2023 was the final year of transition from the 2014-2020 creative Europe programme to the 2021-2027 programme. It finally reached its normal pace of implementation with the adoption of the 2023 annual work programme in August 2022. The 2024 annual work programme followed the same calendar of adoption and implementation – adoption in September 2023, with a publication of the calls in autumn. The 2025 annual work programme will follow the same calendar logic, which will be implemented for all the years to come until the end of the current multiannual financial framework. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its consequences for energy prices and the rate of inflation continued to impact the programme, with an ever-increasing number of requests for support from organisations in the cultural and creative sectors. Moreover, following the earthquake in Syria and Türkiye in February 2023, and upon the request of Türkiye, which as of 2023 was a candidate for participation in the creative Europe programme, the submission deadline for the European cooperation projects call was postponed by 2 weeks.
- To support Ukrainian artists and the Ukrainian cultural sector following the start of the Russian war of aggression, a special call amounting to EUR 5 million was launched under the Culture strand of the 2023 annual work programme. The three selected consortia began to implement their actions in May 2023, and started distributing funding to local projects and organisations in three areas of support: financial support for Ukrainian artists and cultural organisations to create and showcase their art and works in Ukraine and in creative Europe participating countries; actions on the ground helping displaced Ukrainians, and in particular children, to have access to culture to facilitate their integration into their new communities; and capacity building and training for Ukrainian cultural heritage professionals to contribute to the post-war recovery of Ukrainian cultural heritage. Moreover, an amendment to the 2023 creative Europe work programme was voted during the Creative Europe Committee meeting on 28 March 2023 to enable the funding of the creative Europe desk in Ukraine at 100% (normally, the programme co-funds up to 60% of the desk’s budget). This full coverage of the Ukrainian desk’s activities is also included in the 2024 creative Europe annual work programme, and will continue in 2025.
- In 2023, close to EUR 85 million was allocated to the European cooperation projects, the circulation of European literary works, platforms for the promotion of emerging artists, pan-European cultural entities and networks of cultural and creative organisations. An envelope of EUR 60 million was dedicated to the funding of the cooperation projects, allowing the selection of 138 proposed projects. This budget is a decrease of EUR 9 million in comparison to 2022 (which had selected 169 projects), which may explain, when coupled with the constantly increasing number of applications received for calls under the creative Europe programme (831 in 2023), the decreasing success rate for this call (17% in 2023, compared to 27% in 2021 and 26% in 2022). As of February 2024, 136 projects had signed with the executive agency and two had dropped out during the grant-agreement phase. Several more projects from the reserve lists will be added to the final selection. Regarding the call for literary translations, 41 projects were selected for the call published in 2023. Finally, under the culture strand, the Day of European Authors initiative to encourage reading, in particular among young people, was launched in 2023. For its first edition, more than 1 000 events took place in schools, bookstores and libraries simultaneously on 27 March 2023, while a high-level conference was organised in Sofia, Bulgaria.
- Under the MEDIA strand, 13 calls were published in 2023 (for comparison, 15 were launched in 2022, with a record budget). The calls attracted 1 272 proposals altogether (compared to 1 195 in 2022), of which 60% were successful (69% in 2022) , with varying success rate between the calls – revealing an ever-increasing demand for the MEDIA strand of the creative Europe programme among the audiovisual community. The applicants requested a total of EUR 333 million (compared to EUR 389 million in 2022). This comparably higher rate however is due to the implementation of several actions through automatic schemes. In these cases, the relevant indicator is not the success rate, but the actual demand. In fact, the level of support given is always lower than the amount requested and there is much space for increase of grants value in the automatic calls (e.g. last year the value of grants in automatic European Film Distribution were lowered by 30% due to insufficient funds). In other non-automatic calls for proposals the success rate is often as low as 16% (development calls, innovative business models). Some MEDIA calls (eg. videogames and immersive content) have been more narrowly defined, to avoid massive oversubscription, but as a result they cover a small part of the actual funding needs in these emerging two sectors. There were 626 grant agreements signed for a total of EUR 139 million by January 2024, and another 87 grants are expected to be signed soon based on the evaluations done in 2023, amounting to EUR 26 million. The calls in 2023 covered some actions that are only launched once every 2 years (European festivals, audience development and film education) or every 3 years (subtitling of cultural content), so they will not be repeated in 2024.
- Since 2021, the MEDIA strand has been supporting a long-term innovative support measure for the audiovisual industry: the MediaInvest blending facility. The European audiovisual sector faces several challenges simultaneously: it is highly dependent on public funds; independent European companies are under ever greater competitive pressure from the global competitors to raise their production budgets; and private investors consider the audiovisual industry to be risky and avoid much-needed capital investment. The MediaInvest blending facility aims to encourage private investment in the sector. It blends public funds – from creative Europe, InvestEU and the European Investment Fund – with private investment to obtain commercially viable, European-scale audiovisual projects. The backing of public funds will multiply the effect a private investor can have with their funds, thereby decreasing the perceived risks and allowing the projects to reach the critical scale. It will strengthen the position of independent investors by giving them access to increased capital resources. MediaInvest was launched in May 2022, followed by the publication of a call for expressions of interest addressed to financiers. The call, managed by the European Investment Fund, will remain open until 2027. The first investment agreement, for a value of up to EUR 25 million (expected to raise up to EUR 70 million in equity investment), was presented to the public in September 2023, at the San Sebastian Film Festival.
- Under the cross-sectoral strand, a total of four calls for proposals were launched in 2023 (the same number as in 2022). They attracted 224 applications (compared to 243 the previous year), which requested EUR 147 million in total (similar to the EUR 159 million requested in 2022). The success rates of news media actions were the lowest, especially in 2023 (going down to only 8% from 24% in 2022, because of the increasing demand and the low availability of funding available for news media calls). The ‘Journalism Partnerships’, the main action to support news media, is one of the very few ones, across the whole Creative Europe Programme, for which the number of high-quality projects rejected exceeds the number of projects financed.
- For all strands of the programme, the final evaluation of the 2014-2020 programme and the interim evaluation of the 2021-2027 programme were launched in December 2023, with the objective of being finalised by the end of December 2024. An own-initiative report on the implementation of the 2021-2027 creative Europe programme by the European Parliament (rapporteur Massimiliano Smeriglio) was published in December 2023 and adopted on 16 January 2024. The report praised the good implementation of the programme.
- In 2023, several projects in creative Europe exploited synergies between various horizontal objectives of the framework programmes. The following are examples of such projects.
- MIAM! An integrated and sustainable real-time computer-generated imagery production pipeline. The main aim of this project is to innovate in the area of three-dimensional animation based on video game solutions, but it also has an interesting greening component. The new method of creating the animation allows users to save on the servers required, minimising the carbon impact. The other aim of the project is to recycle existing animation material to create new content on its basis with a lower carbon footprint.
- EU youth cinema: Green Deal 2024-2026 is an audience development project aiming at educating an environmentally conscious community of young people. It offers a unique streaming platform, www.euyc.green, which has a strong didactic narrative, with films in six languages and a series of events in 12 countries.
Sustainable development goals
Contribution to the sustainable development goals
| SDGs the programme contributes to | Example |
|---|---|
| SDG3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages | The CCS GF financed a study on the social impact of news media in 2021. Results show that healthy, thriving news media ecosystems increase the wellbeing of citizens. Support to cross-border investigative journalism calls started in 2021. Quality journalism, like the projects supported by MEDIA, increases the knowledge diffusion in society and fights the spread of disinformation, thus increasing, for instane, public health (e.g., through informing about the COVID-19 vaccines). |
| SDG4 Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all | The Skills and Talents action in MEDIA is an example of promoting lifelong learning – it supports courses/trainings/workshops et al directed at audiovisual professionals to become even better and broaden their skillsets (for example in promoting a film, creating visual effects etc.). This objective is supported as well by support provided to media literacy projects under the cross-sectoral strand. |
| SDG5 Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls | As described in the cross-cutting issues of the programme – Gender equality section. For example the films supported under MEDIA with Films on the Move show a higher share of key female creators than is average in the market. Several projects funded under the European Cooperation Projects scheme are relevant to this sustainable development goal, in particular the one addressing gender inequalities in the cultural and creative sectors. Creative Europe networks of cultural and creative organisations also contribute to the sharing of good practices promoting gender equality in the sector. |
| SDG8 Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all | Through the supported provided to artists and cultural professionals in the creative Europe programme, Creative Europe Promote sustained inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all. For example, the European Platforms for Emerging artists promote fair, inclusive, and diverse frameworks supporting emerging artists careers. Platforms must develop in their strategies effective ways to ensure and promote better working conditions and fairer remuneration, skills’ development, and life-long learning as well as artistic freedom. The Media strand of Creative Europe aims to enhance the competitiveness of the audiovisual sectors, thus directly contributing to economic growth. This is a cross-cutting objective. MEDIAinvest, for example, is a new blended investment tool (blending funds from MEDIA and InvestEU) designed to bridge the financial gap in the audiovisual sector. |
| SDG10 Reduce inequalities within and among countries | All actions of creative Europe have an international collaboration aspect. Especially MEDIA has an action that through cascade grants benefits coproductions with developing countries (under 360 action). On the European scale, MEDIA introduced an array of measures to make sure that there is a level playing field for audiovisual professionals from all countries and small-capacity countries are encouraged to enter into collaboration with high-capacity countries (especially through Co-development). Since 2021 there have been at least 498 collaborations under MEDIA involving partners from a low-capacity and a high-capacity country. |
| SDG11 Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable | In the 2022 creative Europe work programme, the creative innovation labs call had a special angle: the projects should contribute to the New European Bauhaus framework for inclusive and sustainable product and experience design. The programme also develops synergies with the New European Bauhaus with projects such as the medium- scale European Cooperation projects ‘ARCH-E, European Platform for Architectural Design Competitions’ aims to promote high-quality architectural solutions for the built environment by increasing the use of architectural design competitions in Europe |
| SDG12 Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns | See cross-cutting issues section – Environmental requirements/ The programme promotes green solutions, especially on the supply side – through bonus points possible to obtain in applications for having sustainable working modalities (in MEDIA). Also, MEDIA is preparing a carbon calculator translation tool to make it easier for co-producers to comply with different carbon regulation regimes (in progress in February 2024). |
| SDG16 Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels | Creative Europe decides on the distribution of the grants on merit base and transparently. Audits are put in place across the programmes overseen by the European Commission and other implementing institutions. The work programme each year is accepted by Member States. The access to the programme is encouraged through a network of country desks, who reach out and explain to potential applicants how to apply. Also, CE funded an online tool – CulturEU- for the convenience of potential applicants from cultural and creative sectors to check funding possibilities for them going beyond creative Europe. |
| SDG17 Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development | The MEDIA strand supports co-production funds located in the EU aimed at cooperating with film institutions in developing countries. With the support from the MEDIA strand in 2014-2020 they supported 114 co-productions between EU and developing countries partners in production and 83 in distribution. |