Pashayev T. Financial Support Instruments of Regional Development in the EU.

The dissertation provides a systematic study of the theoretical foundations for the formation of financial support for regional development in the EU and the evolution of its instruments. The importance of the theory of endogenous development as the theoretical and methodological basis of the EU regional policy is revealed. Structural analysis of the integration component of financial support of EU regional development is carried out. The formation of a new model of financial support of regions in the conditions of distributed (multilevel) regulation of economic processes, its components and their interrelation are determined, the key characteristics of the model are described. Overall, the high effectiveness of approaches to financing the common regional policy in the EU is substantiated, in particular for the economies of the regions of the Member States that are the main beneficiaries of the Cohesion Policy, as well as the crucial role of the regional authority in ensuring convergence of economic development of NUTS 2 regions through the use of financial support. It is determined that the main positive effect of cooperation with the EU in this area is the development by the Ukrainian government of a new regional development management system that meets European standards and practices. The range of main problems is identified: the complexity of the exit of economic agents into EU markets, the unsettled VAT refund legislation, the lack of a full-fledged participation of the state in the system of export credit insurance, undeveloped domestic financial market, a much lower level of development of the border regions of Ukraine in comparison with European ones, limited access to credit resources, etc. A number of measures have been substantiated to overcome them, in particular the emphasis has been placed on the importance of introducing regional development financial support instruments organized on the cluster platform through the new EU initiative – the European cluster approach for growth. Ukraine not only can, but already has a great potential for international cooperation – it is information technology, agro-food, tourism, transport, construction, sports, in the longer term - the aerospace industry. The strategic task for Ukraine is to increase participation in EU transnational partner clusters.