The EU's SURE loans are designed to help member states cover sudden spikes in public spending to preserve jobs, such as national part-time financing programmes and support for the self-employed amid the coronavirus pandemic.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Ana Blaskovic writes on the 25th of August, 2020, four months after the idea was initially put on paper, the European Commission (EC) submitted a proposal to allocate 81.4 billion euros from the SURE instrument to fifteen member states to the council.

According to the proposal, Croatia would receive one billion euros in so-called soft loans to mitigate the devastating effects of the coronavirus pandemic.

Once the proposal is approved by the council, these loans will help member states to cover sudden spikes in public spending on job preservation, such as national part-time funding programmes and support for the self-employed.

After consulting with the EU member states which requested support and assessing their requests, a maximum of 27.4 billion euros was proposed to help Italy, followed by Spain with 21.3 billion euros, Poland with 11.2 billion euros and Belgium with 7.2 billion euros. 8 billion euros.

4 billion euros were on offer for Romania, 2.7 billion to Greece, 2 billion to the Czech Republic, 1.1 billion to Slovenia, and one hundred million euros less was being offered to Croatia. Portugal and Hungary have already submitted their own respective official applications to Brussels and they are currently in the process of being evaluated. Countries that have not yet submitted theirs are free to submit an official request.

Back in April, the European Commission proposed the SURE instrument, worth 100 billion euros, as part of a response to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Loans from this instrument will be based on a system of voluntary guarantees from member states in accordance with the EU's share of gross national income.

“We have to do everything to protect jobs and allow people to earn a living. SURE is a clear symbol of solidarity in an unprecedented crisis,'' said EC President Ursula von der Leyen.

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As Index writes on the 15th of August, 2020, the European Commission (EC) proposes that only member states which actually respect European Union law receive money from the EU. The German media publication Die Welt writes that several countries could be left without hundreds of millions of euros in that case, including Croatia.

"Violations of the law and corruption are much more common in the EU than is generally known. And this phenomenon is spreading, regardless of whether the heads of the government belong to conservative, social democratic or liberal parties," writes the conservative newspaper Die Welt, as reported by DW.

"Alarm bells are ringing in Brussels: The European Commission has proposed that future payments from EU funds be linked to compliance with its regulations. This issue will return to the agenda in the autumn. Many countries could run out of hundreds of millions of euros and therefore the chance for something like that to pass aren't big,'' writes the aforementioned German media publication. It cites Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia and Croatia as problematic countries.

The Republic of Croatia - a problem with corruption

The popular tourist destination, led by Andrej Plenkovic, has a smart head of its government who is well networked in the conservative European People's Party (EPP). But behind that facade there is a dark side, writes Die Welt.

"Corruption is a huge problem in Croatia and it exists at all political levels," said Robin-Ivan Capar, an expert on Croatia at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) research centre.

Capar doesn't exclude Croatian courts here either. In the so-called Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index, Croatia has now dropped down to an unimpressive 63rd place. A new EU report on media diversity makes an utterly disastrous assessment of Croatia: "Journalists are the subject of dirty campaigns, hate messages, death threats, intimidation, police harassment and defamation charges."

The German media publication also states that, according to reports from human rights organisations such as Amnesty International, Croatia partially refuses to receive asylum seekers at its borders without any checks, thus violating European Union law. In addition, it is alleged that the border police are abusing migrants. The Croatian Government has rejected and continues to vehemently reject these ongoing allegations.

Slovenia: Jansa is problematic

Significant policy changes are currently taking place in neighbouring Slovenia, which the European Union's public barely notices, writes the German media. Janez Jansa of the Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS), who was elected prime minister back in March this year and is a friend of Hungarian Prime Minister Orban, is considered to be a fiery nationalist.

"There the are first signs that the independence of the Slovenian judiciary is being called into question. Corruption is also a problem in the judiciary. The courts are partly politicised and don't work in line with the standards we can expect in the EU," said Marko Lovec, a political scientist at the University of Ljubljana.

The EU also complains about the lack of media diversity in Slovenia. According to Lovec, "Hungarian businessmen are currently buying up media in Slovenia."

Jansa's attitude towards freedom of expression is also considered to be disturbed. When he was the leader of the opposition, he slandered two journalists, referring to them prostitutes who had served their time - and the Supreme Court approved that, according to Die Welt.

The European Commission is currently following the case of investigative journalist Blaz Zgaga with concern, who reported (in great detail) on the chaos and corruption during the procurement of respirators and medical masks, and Jansa publicly accused him of lying, the German newspaper states about Slovenia.

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From the perspective of the average tourist, who comes from a country where there are more people infected with the new coronavirus than there are in Croatia, there are no obstacles to spending their holiday on the Croatian Adriatic, in a well-known destination.

As Poslovni Dnevnik/Marija Crnjak writes on the 14th of August, 2020, maybe Croatia should stop bragging about this year's tourism results if it wants to continue at this same pace until the end of the season? It seems that other member states of the European Union are getting irritated at the fact that Croatia is managing to make money from their citizens, who should, in their view, instead be spending that money at home and helping their national economies recover instead of getting sunburn on the Croatian Adriatic.

Some are asking the question of how else we can interpret the decisions of certain countries to close their borders to Croatia, which has a more favourable epidemiological situation than most of the Mediterranean, as well as countries in the rest of Europe? Coronavirus has become a powerful excuse for protectionism, even in the European Union, which likes to describe itself wholeheartedly as anything but that, and it remains to be seen how, in the long-term, such behaviour which is neither transparent nor fair will pay off.

Kudos must be given to the countries that have issued vouchers to their residents to strengthen national tourism when the itch to get away begins. Croatia has good roads, and despite the problems, it has a decent health system, it behaved excellently in the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic, there were relatively few infected people and the vast majority of people respected and continue to respect the obligation to wear a mask.

From the perspective of the average tourist who comes from a country where there are more infected people than there are in Croatia, this all looks fantastic and makes a person feel safe. This led to as many as a million people entering Croatia in the first nine days of August, accounting for 70 percent of last year's number of overnight stays in that same period. In July, Croatian tourism had a turnover of 60 percent when compared to the turnover of last year, which is also a lot considering that it was at that point when things were starting to open up again.

Millions of euros a day are leaking from our emitting markets into Croatia, a country outside of Schengen and the Eurozone, and some people like it less and less. So far, Croatia has been talking about what will happen with Slovenia, Germany, Austria, Hungary, then it was proverbially screwed by the Dutch, and now the Italians, among the hardest hit by the coronavirus pandemic, are back in the picture again, who are introducing mandatory testing for everyone who arrives from Croatia.

A Slovenian Government spokesman is once again threatening to put Croatia on the country's red list. Although officially such decisions are made based on the assessments of epidemiological experts who don't want to endanger the health of their own people or the sustainability of their own health system, it's difficult to believe these arguments when looking at the figures. The Netherlands went the furthest in this regard, declaring Croatia a risky country almost four weeks ago, with the recommendation that all those arriving from Croatia be placed in self-isolation for two weeks upon their arrival in the Netherlands. They decided to make that move even though other European countries with a significantly higher number of infected per 100 thousand inhabitants, such as Spain and Great Britain, are on their list of countries safe for travel.

Looking at it in layman's terms, if we look at the total number of cases of coronavirus and the number of newly infected people, it's much easier for a Dutch person to become infected at home in the Netherlands while using public transport than in Porec on a campsite.

There have been very few infected tourists in Croatia

This fact along makes it difficult to shake off the impression that Croatia and indeed other nations are being judged by the mathematics of money, and not health. Namely, Croatia has about three million overnight stays a year from the Netherlands, and if half of those tourists came to us this summer, Croatia would gain and the Netherlands would lose about 100 million euros in revenue. These tourists are mostly passionate campers who will park their campers on the Dutch coast this summer, and the climate changes that have prolonged and warmed up the Dutch summer are helping them do just that. Spain isn't such a threat to them, because there are no flights, and they don't travel across the North Sea to Britain in the summer anyway.

The Italians kicked off Feragosto, and a good part of them headed for the Croatian part of the Adriatic, although there were still significantly less of them than there were last year. Italian tourism has suffered terribly this year, the spring season was completely devastated, and high hopes for revenue collection remains firmly on Italian tourists staying at home and spending their money in Italy. However, market analyses have shown that while more than two thirds of Italians plan to travel within the country in the coming months, and almost half of the respondents will shorten their travel plans when compared to the period before the coronavirus pandemic struck the enfeebled nation.

Still, every single little euro counts this season, and if the obligation to test on arrival from Croatia demotivates part of the Italian tourists to book accommodation in Croatia, then the Italian state goal has been achieved. At the same time, in the last ten days, 28 reports of infected tourists from four countries, Austria, Italy, Germany and Slovenia, have arrived through the European information system. When compared to the approximately 3.5 million tourists who visited Croatia by August the 10th, it does make one wonder just what the motives behind certain European countries have become. As for the so called European Union, perhaps its better to not take the name quite so literally.

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As Adriano Milovan/Novac writes on the 8th of April, 2020, rather surprisingly, the Republic of Croatia is among the more resilient countries and economies in terms of risks and shocks, the research of insurance company FM Global shows. Could Croatian EU membership also help it to emerge from various forms of crisis more easily?

According to the survey, which included 130 countries worldwide, the Croatian economy ranked 37th in the world in terms of resistance to shocks. According to the calculations of FM Global experts, Croatia is even better ranked than Slovenia, which is ranked 42nd in terms of economic resilience, and is slightly lower than Hungary, which ranked 35th. The Croatian economy, according to the research, is more resistant to shocks than the economy of neighbouring Serbia, which is ranked 63rd, or the economy of another neighbour - Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is ranked a concerning 70th. Croatia also ranked better than Bulgaria, which ranked 45th, and Romania, which has been ranked 36th, is slightly better than us in this survey.

FM Global's research refers more specifically to last year, and it analyses various forms of risk for individual national economies - from political, to economic to natural risks. This insurance company, they say, is primarily a tool that should help the management of companies in making business decisions, including investments.

The study, therefore, doesn't directly address the resilience of world economies to the impact of the current unprecedented coronavirus pandemic. However, as the international media and Croatian analysts point out, the report could also look into the recovery dynamics of the Croatian economy once the coronavirus crisis has ended.

Of course, there are a lot of question marks throughout the story, given that this is a shock that the world, and one that even the historically unlucky Croatia has not yet encountered. Questions have been raised as to how long the coronavirus-induced crisis will last, as well as what its consequences could be. But, the economists Novac spoke with hope that Croatia will still emerge from the coronavirus recession more quickly than it did during last recession, in which the country spent six very long years. The reason is simple: Croatian EU membership, a badge which gives it the opportunity to make greater use of money from European Union funds, and makes it subject to the rules of conduct of the Union.

''Today, Croatia is in a different situation than it was in back in 2008 and 2009. The EU has forced the government to stabilise public finances, and much has been done in this regard, with interest rates lower today than at the beginning of the last crisis. In addition, this time, the government reacted swiftly and adopted packages of measures for businesses. Therefore, the chances of a faster recovery today are certainly higher than they were during the last crisism'' says Damir Novotny, a reputable economic analyst.

He added that Croatian EU membership is particularly important here, which certainly strengthens the overall resilience of the Croatian economy. Because of all this, Novotny believes, the prospects for the recovery of the Croatian economy are much better today than they were when the last recession hit the country.

This does not mean, however, that once the coronavirus crisis is over, that recovery will go smoothly and quickly. For starters, Croatia depends very much on tourism, and this year's tourist season can already be considered lost. This means that tourism recovery, which generates a fifth of Croatia's gross domestic product (GDP), can only be expected next year. Furthermore, Novotny warned, Croatia has also entered a new crisis with the same problem as in the last recession - the country's infamous, draconian, cumbersome, inefficient and ubiquitous public sector.

He therefore proposes that Croatia does what the Baltic countries did at the beginning of last recession, and embark on rapid public sector reform. This, he noted, would open up space for the private sector, which would make it easier to get access to the money needed and speed up the recovery of the Croatian economy.

Macroeconomist Goran Šaravanja also believes that Croatia's recovery from the crisis could be much quicker than it was in the last recession. He sees the biggest asset to that precisely in Croatian EU membership.

''Croatia's risk perception is lower today. You can see that when we compare ourselves with countries not yet in the EU, like Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina: they're not yet under the EU umbrella and don't have access to such large EU funds as we do, nor are they part of the common market, so, they're riskier,'' explained Šaravanja.

In addition, he added, both the Croatian state, companies, and the population have been quite dilapidated in recent years, making the situation a little easier. In addition, in the past crisis, Croatia entered a double deficit - in the current account of the balance of payments and in the state budget, and this situation has changed in recent years.

"All this will make it easier for Croatia to recover, which, without these mechanisms, would be much harder and much slower," concluded Šaravanja, adding that despite that, the country's recovery will not go either quickly or easily.

Otherwise, according to the Resilience Index, Norway, which is not an EU member state but does hold membership of the EEA has the highest resistance to risks and shocks, and Denmark is the strongest among EU member states. On the other hand, the least resilience among the countries covered by the survey was demonstrated by Haiti, coming in an unimpressive 130th place. Compared to 2018, Rwanda has experienced the biggest leap on the ladder, and Northern Macedonia has seen the biggest drop, a survey shows.

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As Morski writes on the 7th of June, 2019, the European Commission (EC) has recognised the value of the energy transition of European islands in 2019, in line with the Clean Energy for the EU islands initiative, the foundation of which can be credited to Croatian MEP, Tonino Picula.

The relevant text from the European Commission states quite specifically that there is a great potential for investing in wind and solar energy and energy from renewable sources for heating and cooling. Promoting such investments could increase the energy self-sustainability of Croatian islands, in line with the Clean Energy Initiative for the European Union's islands.

''I was very pleased to receive the news of additional affirmation and support for the European island transition policy, which was announced today by the European Commission. It's a confirmation that there is room for completely new initiatives and programs for raising the quality of life of EU citizens,'' said Tonino Picula, who will begin his third term in the European Parliament at the beginning of July this year.

He stressed that such clear support to the program, as has been strongly expressed by the European Commission, would be an additional argument to see an increase the European Comission Secretariat's budget to more than one hundred million euros during the next budget period.

Among the list of items in the European Commission's focus are investment policy on research and innovation, sustainable urban and rail transport, energy efficiency, renewable energy sources and environmental infrastructure, all of which are clearly highlighted, taking into account regional differences and increasing the capacity of the competent bodies to realise and implement public projects and policies, which Picula has often emphasised in all of his recent criticisms of the current capacity of Croatian institutions to properly carry out this demanding job.

Picula, along with his colleagues in the European Parliament, initiated the need for the adoption of a resolution on the special situation of the islands, which the European Parliament quickly recognised as the need to adopt special policies relating to islanders and their lives, given that they are often greatly different to that of people living on the mainland.

To briefly recall, as many as ten Croatian islands, out of a total of fifty of the country's inhabited islands, are participating in energy transition pilot projects, which makes Croatia the most successful member of the EU in this competition.

Cres, Ilovik, Lošinj, Male Srakane, Susak, Unije, Velike Srakane and Brač, Hvar and Korčula have been enabled to prepare for the use of renewable energy sources, which will help these islands to better preserve the environment and raise the quality of life of their inhabitants.

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