Tamás Szemlér The National(Lisbon) Reform Programmes(NRPs) of the member states of the European Union(EU) fit well into this logic. In order to cope with the challenges of global competition, member states had to elaborate mid-term reform programmes, containing an analysis of their actual situation as well as a plan of measures to be taken in the fields concerned(macroeconomic issues, microeconomic issues, employment issues). Despite their novelty, it is very difficult to see them alone, because they contain a lot of aspects which are already present in other programmes or plans. This is also true for the case of Hungary. In this paper, we will have an over­view of the NRP of Hungary, bearing in mind its overlaps with two other pro­grammes: the National Strategic Reference Framework(NSRF), designed for identifying the main development objectives and for the efficient use of(EU and national) financial resources, and the Convergence Programme(CP), the fulfil­ment of which is crucial for getting closer to the introduction of the euro. On the basis of the analysis, the reader can identify the main points where these pro­grammes can be strengthened and also those where they can be opposed to each other. The structure of the paper is the following: in the first part, we will discuss the connections between the above-mentioned three issues and the three related programmes. Then, we put the Lisbon Agenda, and the NRP into the foreground, and present the situation and the priorities in Hungary- according to the logic of the Integrated Guidelines for Growth and Jobs(IGs)- in the field of macroeco­nomic policy, microeconomics and employment issues. Finally, we discuss the NRP's success chances in Hungary, with special regard to its“environment” (institutional background as well as consistency vs. conflicts with other pro­grammes or policy areas); these remarks can also be relevant for other new or future EU member states. THREE ISSUES- THREE PROGRAMMES Hungarian economic policy objectives are in many aspects closely linked to the conditions the country has to fulfil in order to comply with EU requirements. These links can be best summarised in the case of three issues: ! The main overall economic objective of the country is to catch up to the EU average development level. EU funds(the Structural Funds and the Cohesi­on Fund) play a very important role in this process, especially with regard to the increase of funds available from 2007(on average, between 2007-2013, 118