The European Commission paid out the first €50 million to Slovenia from the Recovery and Resilience Facility on 20 April after the country met the 12 milestones required.

"Today's payment is made possible by Slovenia's fulfilment of the 12 milestones linked to the first instalment. These cover important reforms promoting the digital transformation of the Slovenian economy, reforms improving the country's business environment, on long-term care and on the country's audit and control system for the implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Facility.

"Other milestones concern investments in low-power processors and semiconductor chips as well as in European common data infrastructure and services," the Commission said.

Slovenia's overall recovery and resilience plan will be supported by €1.50 billion in grants and up to €3.2 billion in loans. To date, the country has received €281 million in grants, including today's payment and the €231 million in pre-financing it received in September 2021.

The Finance Ministry has prepared a preliminary list of investments that will either be excluded from the updated recovery and resilience plan or will have their grant funding reduced. The adjustment is necessary partly also because the country is eligible for €286 million less grants (€1.49 billion) due to better economic growth in recent years, and because of the inclusion of the REPowerEU plan's objectives to reduce dependence on Russian energy.