Norwegian Government plans to meet NATO’s 2 % goal by 2026

‘Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has changed the security landscape in Europe. We must continue to strengthen the Norwegian Armed Forces and the defence alliance that we are a part of. We are therefore announcing that Norway will increase its defence spending to a minimum of 2 % of our gross domestic product by 2026 and we will draw up a plan setting out how we will achieve this,’ said Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre.

In 2014, all NATO member countries agreed to move towards the 2 % of GDP defence investment guideline by 2024. Nearly ten years have now passed since this goal was set without of a clear Norwegian commitment to the 2 % goal. Norway will announce the commitment to reach this goal and outline how that will be done at the NATO Summit in Vilnius in July.

‘For decades we have been able to collect a peace dividend and now the price of our insurance premium has gone up. We must allocate a larger part of the available resources to defence, security and preparedness. It is necessary to further increase the defence budgets in the years ahead, and it is essential for Norway to commit to reaching the 2 % goal by 2026,’ said Minister of Finance Trygve Slagsvold Vedum.

The exact amount of funding this will require will depend on the GDP forecast for Norway for 2026, among other things. This is difficult to predict.

‘It is vital to our national security that we commit to NATO’s 2 % goal. We are currently working on a new long-term defence plan to be presented next year. It will set out how we plan to increase defence spending and strengthen our armed forces. We have already concluded that we need a larger defence force and must use more resources to increase our military presence in all our areas of responsibility, particularly at sea,’ said Minister of Defence Bjørn Arild Gram.