Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions. The Marco Polo programme – results and outlook

The Marco Polo programme was established as a result of the White Paper on the Common Transport Policy of September 2001. The White Paper paper proposed that more intensive use of short sea shipping, rail and inland waterway transport should be key elements in the development of intermodality as a practical and effective means to achieve a balanced transport system.

Article 14 of Regulation 1692/2006 provides that the Commission shall present to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of Regions a Communication on the results achieved by the Marco Polo programmes for the period 2003–2010.

The performance of the programmes was assessed in the framework of an external evaluation. For the needs of the Communication, the findings of the evaluation have subsequently been updated with additional information, including operational data obtained up till November 2012.

Further, the Communication provides a general outlook on the next steps and the approach towards support for innovative and sustainable freight transport services in the period covered by the next Multi-annual Financial Framework (MFF) 2014–2020.

Finally, the Commission Staff Working Document accompanying this Communication presents relevant statistical data and analysis of the specific issues mentioned in Article 14(2a) of Regulation 1692/2006.

• Primary Source

EUR-Lex: COM(2013)278: Follow the progress of this communication through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2013:278:FIN

EUR-Lex: SWD(2013)174: Commission Staff Working Document accompanying the communication http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=SWD:2013:174:FIN

ESO: Background information: Have the Marco Polo programmes been effective in shifting traffic off the road? http://www.europeansources.info/record/special-report-no-03-2013-have-the-marco-polo-programmes-been-effective-in-shifting-traffic-off-the-road/

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