The confederation of European business, BusinessEurope, considers that European smart technological sovereignty is desirable for European competitiveness as long as it is articulated with maintaining the commercial openness of the European Union, according to its position paper published on Thursday 25 June.
“It is time for Europe to start acting more strategically and to proactively position itself in the changing international sphere”, the organisation says, insisting that technological sovereignty must be translated into a strengthening of the resources of European companies and not in any way into a “protectionist and restrictive” approach. And to hammer home once again that protectionism will only lead to a weakening of the EU, by depriving companies of “their international business base”. Furthermore, it is “unrealistic”, according to the organisation, to envisage the development and production of all the components of a product based on European technology alone.
For BusinessEurope, the Union must continue to defend multilateralism while sharpening its trade defence instruments, in particular against foreign direct investment, while consolidating its technological resources, by laying down the conditions and incentives in the long term to channel investment towards key sectors (robotics, Internet of Things, 5G, quantum computing).
With the Covid-19 pandemic, the European Union is considering how to regain its autonomy in 14 economic ecosystems considered to be strategic. Although some Member States would like to see a large-scale partial relocation of production chains, the EU Council seems to be moving towards a hybrid solution which would not fundamentally challenge the Union's relationship with the international trade order, but would aim to improve its ability to mobilise production chains in non-Member States (see EUROPE 12488/3).
To view the full document: https://bit.ly/2Bg0jmS (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)