At Mediterranean Economic Week in Marseilles on Thursday 3 November, Commissioner for EU Neighbourhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations Johannes Hahn said the Mediterranean vitally needed to create new jobs and to this end, should focus on microenterprises, the digital economy and encouraging innovation. The week was organised by local private sector organisations (including ANIMA and FEMISE). Hahn said the EU would provide its backing for taking on these important challenges.
"Five million new jobs need to be created every year to employ a growing work force and to ensure social inclusion", said the commissioner in his opening speech, explaining that "to create this number of jobs, economic growth in the region should accelerate from the 2.5% to 3.5% of recent years to above 6%". "Though this is a very ambitious target, I believe that the innovative possibilities offered by digital technology, can help to achieve it", he said.
"The development of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) is crucial", Hahn said but much remains to be done. He added: "According to the 2015 World Bank Report on the cost of doing business, many Mediterranean partner countries still suffer from a weak regulatory and administrative environment, which hampers both domestic and international business". Hahn said this would require diversification of Mediterranean trade "which remains oriented mainly towards Europe", and largely ignores other Southern Mediterranean partners (5% of EuroMed trade) with an even lower percentage of inter-southern Mediterranean foreign direct investment.
Hahn said technological innovation "has created new services and products, giving access to vast amounts of information and raising the voice of ordinary citizens". "There is no doubt that the sustainable society of tomorrow will be a digital one", he added.
He went on to list the structures and financing that it would be possible to mobilise to achieve this strategic objective. Hahn said €2 billion is available from the neighbourhood investment fund and the foreign investment fund set up by the Commission this year. (Original version in French by Fathi B’Chir)