Every year, the European Commission produces strategy documents in a cycle known as the strategic planning and programming cycle.
The Commission conducts this cycle to ensure that it is on track to achieve the political priorities determined by the President of the Commission at the beginning of their five-year term.
Our latest strategy documents
Political guidelines
The EU’s overall political strategy is developed jointly by its institutions: the European Parliament, European Council, Council of the European Union, and European Commission.
Following exchanges with the other institutions, the President of the Commission determines the political priorities for its mandate. At the beginning of a new Commission term, the President of the Commission sets out the priority areas for that term in the political guidelines.
Commission work programme
The annual work programme sets out the Commission’s plan for the year ahead. It is adopted after the President’s State of the Union address and outlines how the Commission’s political priorities will be turned into concrete actions.
Strategic plans
Strategic plans are planning documents where Commission departments describe how they will support the Commission's broader political priorities and define specific department objectives for a five-year period.
Management plans
Management plans outline each Commission department’s activities for the year and explain how these will contribute to meeting the objectives that were set out in its strategic plan.
Executive agencies’ annual work programmes
The annual work programmes of the executive agencies outline how they plan to implement their spending programme, as well as the priorities of their respective parent departments.
The executive agencies also use their annual work programmes to report their performance based on predefined indicators. These indicators are determined over the course of the long-term EU budget.
Read the 2023 annual work programmes of the executive agencies
Annual activity reports
Annual activity reports present the progress that Commission departments have made in achieving the objectives set in their strategic and management plans.
Annual management and performance reports
The annual management and performance report provides an overview of the results achieved by the EU budget and explains how the budget was managed and protected.
Read the current and previous annual management and performance reports
The strategic planning and programming cycle
At the beginning of a new Commission term, the President of the Commission sets out the priority areas for that term in the political guidelines. The cycle begins with the annual Commission work programme which outlines what the Commission plans to achieve in the year ahead.
Each Commission department (except the executive agencies) sets multi-year strategic plans at the beginning of a new Commission term. The strategic plans, along with the Commission work programme, form the basis of each department’s annual management plans. These plans (or an annual work programme, in the case of the executive agencies) define the department’s main objectives for the year ahead and explain how they will contribute to the Commission's overall priorities.
At the end of the year, all departments produce an annual activity report (or an annual work programme, in the case of the executive agencies) which details the progress they have made towards achieving their objectives for that year. These annual activity reports are the basis for the Commission’s annual management and performance report, which explains how the EU budget contributed to the Commission’s achievements during that year. Through the annual management and performance report, the College of Commissioners takes political responsibility for the overall management of the EU budget in a given year.