The Ministry of Transport of the Government of the Canary Islands, headed by Sebastián Franquis, announced this Wednesday that it will receive the transfer of an initial amount of 5,044,282 euros from European funds to implement the digitization of companies dedicated to providing passenger and freight transport services in the islands.
These funds, which are included within the EU's Next Generation Recovery and Resilience mechanism, will be used to support small and medium-sized enterprises, as well as the self-employed, in the freight and passenger transport sector.
Once the funds are received, the Regional Directorate General of Transport will publish a call for free competition so that interested companies and self-employed workers can apply for aid from the Government of the Canary Islands. Depending on the type of action, the number of employees and the number of vehicles, SMEs and the self-employed may be eligible for aid ranging from 600 to 12,000 euros.
This aid will be used to enable SMEs and the self-employed to digitize, among other services, the management of electronic control documents, the implementation of smart tachographs, the implementation of SAE (Operation Assistance System) systems or the implementation of applications for claims by electronic means.
This digitization aid program is scheduled to last until June 2024, so there will be new contributions from European funds for SMEs and the self-employed in the Archipelago.
On the other hand, this National Conference also explained the scope of the aid measures approved in Royal Decree Law 11/2022 to deal with the economic consequences of the war in Ukraine. The Ministry proposes a 30% reduction in transport passes for regular passenger transport operators by road, for which a global item of 200 million is established for the whole of Spain, which will be distributed among the managing entities of these services.
In the case of the Canary Islands, it is the local and supramunicipal entities (councils, town councils and associations of municipalities) that manage public passenger transport by road in the archipelago, without the Ministry having yet set the criteria for the distribution of funds.