A coalition of 26 European music organisations, including IMPALA, the trade association for independent music companies, has issued a statement welcoming a draft European Parliament report that proposes a dedicated music strand within the AgoraEU programme.
The draft report, authored by MEPs Rafowicz and Kuhnke, recommends creating a “Culture – Music” strand, a move the signatories describe as a significant step that answers the sector’s long-standing call for targeted support reflecting music’s economic, cultural and social weight.
Proposed Funding and Key Priorities
The report earmarks 15% of the financial envelope allocated to the Culture – Creative Europe, Culture – Music and Culture – MEDIA strands for music. The organisations welcomed this as an essential milestone and a starting point, but stressed that if AgoraEU is to help European music grow and compete internationally, the figure must be treated as a floor, not a ceiling.
The draft text identifies several priorities, which the statement endorses:
- Strengthening the sustainability, competitiveness and independence of the music sector
- Establishing a European Music Observatory
- Addressing market concentration, digital platform dynamics and artificial intelligence
- Prioritising human creativity and improving working conditions, fair remuneration and social protection for artists and cultural professionals
- Tackling discoverability, access to finance, diversity, inclusion and cross-border circulation
Economic Contribution and Structural Challenges
The statement underscores music’s economic footprint: across the EU27 and the UK, the sector contributes €81.9 billion in gross value added to GDP, directly employs more than 1.3 million people (15% of all jobs in the cultural and creative sectors), and generates €9.7 billion in export revenue.
Despite that scale, the organisations argue that music operates through a complex and fragile value chain dominated by independent artists and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. The sector faces structural pressures including opaque streaming systems, limited cross-border circulation, fragmented markets, AI disruption, administrative barriers and unequal access to data and finance.
Sector Dialogue and Digital Fines
Structured dialogue with the sector should be central to the music strand, the statement says, with the proposed European Music Observatory and future data work directly informing policy, programme design and annual calls. This would help ensure AgoraEU continues to respond to real needs across the music sector.
The signatories also support the proposal to channel digital fines into AgoraEU as an additional funding source. Redirecting penalties from breaches of EU digital legislation could bring extra resources without increasing pressure on Member State contributions, and is especially relevant given creators’ and music professionals’ exposure to platform dominance, AI disruption and digital market imbalances.
The statement concludes by calling on EU institutions to build on this progress during negotiations and ensure the music strand has the funding, sector dialogue and practical tools needed to deliver long-term support.
