Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said on Monday that the European Commission's President Uersula Von der Leyen would arrive in Zagreb on Thursday after the European Commission approved Croatia's national recovery and resilience plan.

President von der Leyen has decided to personally deliver the national recovery and resilience plan to each of the 27 member states.

PM Plenkovic said that the green-light to Croatia’s €6.3 billion recovery plan was an important encouragement.

“We are satisfied with the finalisation of the process before we expected,” Plenković said on Monday evening.

In early June, Croatia and another four EU member-states — Slovenia, Poland, Sweden and Romania — asked the European Commission to extend a deadline for the assessment of their national recovery and resilience plans.

The EC had two months to assess these plans that set out the reforms and public investment projects that each Member State plans to implement with the support of the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF).

The rules envisage that member-states can request a reasonable extension of time for the assessment of national recovery and resilience plans after the documents are submitted.

The Commission received Croatia’s plan on 15 May, and Zagreb “has requested a total of almost €6.4 billion in grants under the RRF”, the EC says on its website.

The Croatian plan is structured around five components: green and digital economy, public administration and judiciary, education, science and research, labour market and social protection, healthcare. It also encompasses one initiative on building renovation.

The plan includes measures to improve business environment, education, research and development, energy-efficiency in buildings, zero-emission transport and the development of renewable energy sources.

Projects in the plan cover the entire lifetime of the RRF until 2026. The plan proposes projects in all seven European flagship areas, the EC added.