Future earning capacity requires more than a new taskforce

Last Friday, the final Ministerial Council meeting of the political year took place, after which the government published its long-awaited response to the Wennink report on the investment climate and the Netherlands’ future earning capacity. It also published an update on the Taskforce for Future Prosperity and the Business Climate, as well as the accompanying Talent Strategy.

The direction is clear: earning capacity, productivity and the investment climate are high on the political agenda. However, many decisions remain open and have been postponed until later this year. The August budget decision-making round will therefore be an initial test for the minority Jetten I government, which depends on opposition support to pass its budget. Precisely because many details have yet to be settled, there remains considerable scope in the coming months to help shape the further implementation of the Wennink report.

A familiar diagnosis, renewed urgency

The government’s response follows The Route to Future Prosperity, the report Peter Wennink presented in December 2025 on strengthening the investment climate and earning capacity. His analysis is sharp, but not new: the Dutch economy is growing too slowly, productivity growth is levelling off, population ageing is putting pressure on the labour market and public finances, and Europe is falling further behind the United States and China in critical technologies.

The report’s strength lies primarily in the way it brings these familiar problems together. The Netherlands does not lack analyses or policy agendas; from Draghi and Letta to the State Commission on Demographic Developments, the same message continues to emerge. If the Netherlands wants to continue investing in healthcare, education, security, climate policy and social security in the future, its economy must become more productive and its investment climate must improve.

The government endorses this message and has now committed itself to a concrete target: structural economic growth of 1.5 per cent. Not as an end in itself, but as a precondition for broad-based prosperity.

Ambition with limited financial banking

At the same time, the government remains cautious about the financial implications of Wennink’s analysis. While Wennink estimates that €151–187 billion in public and private investment in R&D, capital and education will be required over the next ten years, the government mainly points to instruments that are still under development: a National Investment Institution, a National Agency for Disruptive Innovation and the continued use of the National Growth Fund.

On paper, these instruments could form a logical chain: strengthening ecosystems, accelerating technological breakthroughs and helping companies scale up. However, their size, governance and financial firepower remain unclear. This illustrates the central tension in the government’s response: its ambitions are substantial, but budgetary caution prevails. That is understandable from an administrative perspective for a minority government that must steer its first budget through a divided parliament, but it also makes the response vulnerable. At precisely the point where Wennink calls for clear choices, the government postpones many of them.

Preconditions as the greatest obstacle

A central conclusion of the Wennink report is that the Netherlands does not necessarily lack ideas or a willingness to invest. The problem is that investments are too often obstructed by familiar bottlenecks: nitrogen restrictions, grid congestion, high energy prices, slow permitting procedures, limited space, regulatory burdens and shortages of technical and digital talent.

The government acknowledges these problems and sets out several concrete intentions. It wants to abolish or simplify at least 500 rules each year, establish reduction targets for each ministry and submit an annual Simplification Act to Parliament. Permitting procedures should also be accelerated, including by allowing construction and application procedures to run in parallel wherever possible. For strategically important projects, the government intends to take a stronger coordinating role at national level.

These are relevant steps, but previous governments have struggled to achieve breakthroughs on precisely these issues. Reducing regulatory burdens requires more than simply removing rules: it also concerns implementation, supervision, the effects of European legislation and the willingness of government departments to assess risks differently. Illustratively, the government announced two weeks ago that it had abolished or simplified only around 100 rules over the past year, against a target of 500.

Integrated ambition, fragmented implementation

A second theme concerns the geopolitical dimension of earning capacity. Wennink argues that dependencies are not necessarily problematic, provided they are mutual. Europe must remain strategically relevant by retaining sufficient strength in critical technologies. The government has therefore selected four domains: Digitalisation & AI, Security & Resilience, Energy & Climate Technology, and Life Sciences & Biotechnology. Within these domains, it is focusing on six markets, including Digital Services & AI, semiconductors, defence-related applications and innovative chemistry.

The Taskforce for Future Prosperity and the Business Climate is intended to help implement this agenda and coordinate the activities of government departments, companies, knowledge institutions, regions and financiers. This is necessary because the agenda cuts across traditional policy areas: education, the labour market, energy, infrastructure, taxation, digitalisation and innovation are all directly interconnected.

This is also where the risk lies. Interdepartmental coordination is often the weak point of such initiatives, as is also evident from the follow-up to the Letta and Draghi reports. The Taskforce can only make a difference if it becomes more than a forum for consultation and is given influence over the issues that obstruct investment. Key challenges such as nitrogen restrictions, grid congestion and regulatory burdens are recognised as crucial, but partly fall outside the Taskforce’s direct remit. If the ambition is integrated but decision-making power remains fragmented, another gap between analysis and implementation may emerge.

Talent as a precondition for growth

The Talent Strategy is one of the first substantive components of the broader agenda. Due to population ageing and labour shortages, the Netherlands will have to achieve more with relatively fewer workers. The strategy therefore focuses not only on increasing labour supply, but also on working more efficiently, providing more targeted education and training, promoting lifelong learning and pursuing selective migration.

Notably, the government is making an explicit choice: additional efforts will not be directed towards every sector facing shortages, but towards the four strategic domains and essential societal sectors such as education, childcare, healthcare and housing construction.

Technical and digital talent receive particular attention. The government also wants to strengthen cooperation between education and business and connect international students and highly skilled migrants more directly to priority sectors. This is logical from a policy perspective, but politically sensitive. The focus on international talent sits alongside the aim of reducing low-paid, low-productivity labour migration and limiting internationalisation in other parts of higher education.

Parliament must now act

The government’s response to Wennink sets out its overall direction, but leaves many important decisions open. How exactly will the National Investment Institution and innovation agency be designed? Which rules will actually be abolished? How will talent shortages, grid congestion and slow permitting procedures be addressed in practice? The debate in the House of Representatives in early September will therefore be more than a reflection on the Wennink report: it will be the first opportunity for Parliament to press the government to make the agenda more concrete.

This will take place against the backdrop of the budget negotiations leading up to Budget Day, or Prinsjesdag. For a minority government that depends on opposition support, the parliamentary budget debates in the autumn will also be decisive. The question is therefore not only whether Parliament shares the government’s ambition, but above all which choices, resources and decision-making powers it is prepared to attach to it.

Would you like to know more about the government’s response, the underlying documents or the opportunities to influence their further development? Please contact Paul Schrama. For questions about the European implications, our colleagues at Whyte EU would also be happy to assist.