The impact of structural and cohesion funds on Eurozone convergence, 1990-2010

Ever since the launch of the European integration process, and in particular in the context of Economic and Monetary Union, the European Union has endeavoured to facilitate economic convergence across Europe by providing funds to its poorer regions and countries. The main objective of this paper is to analyse whether the Structural and Cohesion Funds have contributed towards convergence between the Eurozone countries during the past two decades, 1990–2010. The results of the spatio-temporal econometric model specified in this paper illustrate that these funds have positively contributed to the gross domestic product per inhabitant (GDPPC) growth of receiving regions, thus allowing them to reach (conditional) convergence.