31/10/2025
The Global Gateway is the EU’s strategic plan for secure and quality connectivity and infrastructure globally. It has a dual ambition: to strengthen EU strategic interests, autonomy and security, while building mutually beneficial partnerships that foster sustainable development and growth for partner countries. Achieving success hinges on carefully managing the synergies and trade-offs between these geostrategic and development objectives.
The Global Gateway (GG) represents the European Union’s flagship initiative to strengthen its international engagement through strategic investment partnerships. Announced in 2021, the strategy aims to position the EU as a key global actor in sustainable, high-quality infrastructure and secure connectivity, with the target of mobilising €300 billion by 2027. Following recent announcements by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at the Global Gateway Forum, the EU has already surpassed its initial goal, reaching €306 billion in investment mobilised by October 2025. The strategy is now poised to scale up its target to €400 billion by 2027.
At its core, the Global Gateway aims to combine external investment, development cooperation and economic diplomacy within a single strategic framework. The intention is to go beyond traditional development finance and to build long-term, mutually beneficial partnerships that align with both partner countries’ priorities and European interests. This reflects a broader shift in the EU’s external policy – from a primarily development-centred approach towards a more geostrategic use of investment tools.
A strategy extending beyond development finance
One of the defining features of the new Global Gateway is its effort to move beyond traditional development finance by development finance institutions (DFIs) and public development banks (PDBs), particularly the European Investment Bank (EIB), which serve as the central vehicles for external investment. While these actors remain central to the EU’s approach, the strategy also seeks to engage the European private sector more directly, through trade and investment promotion.
The rationale is that achieving large-scale mobilisation of capital in a more geopolitically fragmented, polarised and competitive world will require greater participation from European private investors and companies, particularly in areas such as digital infrastructure, renewable energy, transport, healthcare, clean tech & innovation and food. By doing so, the Global Gateway reflects a dual ambition: to strengthen European self-interests, enhancing the EU’s economic resilience, strategic autonomy, competitiveness and security, while providing investment opportunities that can contribute to partner countries’ own priorities towards sustainable growth and achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs), in mutually beneficial partnerships. In this context, the Global Gateway functions not only as a development instrument but also as a geoeconomic strategy. The balance between these dual ambitions will be at the centre of the success of the Global Gateway. Managing synergies and trade-offs, avoiding the potential capture of EU development policy by European self-interest, and enhancing the coordination of the EU’s external financial tools will be key.
Developing tools for European and global engagement
To implement this strategic ambition, the European Commission has introduced new coordination mechanisms and financial instruments to better align the various components of the EU’s external investment architecture.
A central feature is the Global Gateway Investment Hub, which should serve as a coordination platform for the European Commission, EU member states, DFIs, PDBs, export credit agencies (ECAs) and technical development agencies. Building on Team Nationals – national groups coordinating Global Gateway initiatives, bringing together a country’s government ministries, public financial institutions and development agencies – the Hub is designed to enhance coherence between different financing sources and ensure a more strategic alignment between EU and member states’ actions in a ‘Team Europe approach’. Ensuring an effective and lightweight coordination mechanism that is accessible to the European private sector while building on strong local ownership in the EU’s partner countries will be essential but challenging.
A proper transparent governance mechanism for the Global Gateway must also be established, providing strategic guidance and accountability to the EU Member States (via the Council of the EU) and the European Parliament, while remaining flexible and adaptable to investment opportunities in a rapidly evolving international environment.
The European Commission also emphasises the need for a 360-degree approach that combines financial investments with broader support for institutional capacity, skills development and regulatory reform. Such complementary actions are intended to enhance the sustainability of investments by strengthening local ecosystems and governance frameworks. In this respect, Global Gateway initiatives are expected to be accompanied by technical assistance, policy dialogue, and institutional cooperation, reflecting the EU’s traditional emphasis on partnership and capacity building.
Looking to the future, proposals under the next EU’s long-term budget – the Multiannual Financial Framework (MFF) 2028-2034 – should be further elaborated and envisage a clearer distinction between the two complementary pillars. The first would focus on supporting European private sector internationalisation, potentially through an external pillar of the European Competitiveness Fund (ECF) and stronger engagement with ECAs. The second, under the Global Europe Instrument (GEI), would continue to focus on development cooperation and finance, mostly based on official development assistance (ODA), relying on development agencies, DFIs and PDBs to address partner countries’ structural challenges. Together, these pillars could help streamline the EU’s financial external action and improve coordination between instruments with distinct objectives. As it stands, the initial European Commission’s proposal, while making cross-references to the ECF and GEI, combines all Global Gateway objectives under the GEI, with the possibility of using ODA (and therefore tied aid) to support European self-interests and the EU private sector.
Leveraging development finance in new ways
While the Global Gateway signals a desire to engage new types of financiers, development finance remains an important part of the strategy. The EU has expressed its intention to continue leveraging DFIs and PDBs, including through policy-based and results-based loans, as well as innovative financial instruments such as green, social, sustainable and sustainability-linked (GSSS) bonds.
Additional approaches to be considered should include sustainable debt swaps, local currency lending and mechanisms to mobilise institutional investors through guarantees and securitisation structures. While the Global Gateway narrative focuses on individual ‘flagship’ projects, the emphasis should remain on portfolio-level operations, rather than individual project deals, as a means to achieve scale and manage risk across diverse markets. These instruments should be part of a broader effort to expand the EU’s financial toolkit and to utilise public resources in ways that can attract additional private capital towards sustainable investment goals.
A broader geostrategic development perspective
Although investment is at the centre of the Global Gateway, the EU should continue to stress the importance of addressing wider development challenges that cannot be resolved through infrastructure or financial instruments alone. The Global Gateway should thus remain part of a more comprehensive policy framework that encompasses peace and security, governance, migration, climate adaptation and human development, as well as contribute to the provision of global and regional public goods and the resilience of partner societies. This integrated perspective aligns with long-standing EU priorities in external action, notably the commitment to sustainable development, multilateral cooperation, and rules-based partnerships.
Photo credits: European Union, 2023
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