The European Commissioner for Internal Market, Thierry Breton, indicated on Thursday 25 February, at the end of an informal meeting of the European Ministers for Competitiveness, that the details of the future Single Market Emergency Instrument, announced earlier in the week (see EUROPE 12664/29), should be a little more detailed in April.
“We will outline our thinking in April in our industry and single market package [originally planned for March – see EUROPE 12664/28, editor’s note], but actually a regulation will probably follow only after”, he replied to EUROPE.
“The idea is not to rely only on ad hoc solutions and goodwill when we have a crisis to pick up the phone to call individual ministers, like I did last year and as I am still doing a little bit now”, he noted with some irony. The aim, he stressed, is to guarantee the free movement of goods, services and people, with greater transparency and coordination, in order to speed up decision-making in crisis situations.
Cooperation with the United States
On Wednesday 24 February, US President Joe Biden signed an executive order to assess US dependencies on third countries in four areas: semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, rare earths and high-capacity batteries.
Asked by EUROPE for a reaction, Mr Breton said he was not surprised by this decision. “We did exactly the same exercise and exactly for the same key topics”, he commented, believing that Europe and the United States had the same “parallel agenda” on these four areas.
For the Commissioner, who is responsible for the ‘taskforce’ to speed up production of vaccines against Covid-19 (see EUROPE 12663/9), the US and the EU also share a parallel agenda in the fight against the pandemic. “I think that more and more we understand that we will cooperate in order to make sure of that together”, said the Commissioner, who predicts similar vaccine production capacity between the two continents by the end of the year.
“We will be by far, by very far, the two continents able to provide enough vaccines. For our own fellow citizens, of course, but also for the entire planet. It gives us, of course, a responsibility”, he concluded.
The importance of cross-border investments via Next Generation EU
During the morning session, the Ministers confirmed their willingness to give a pre-eminent role to the Competitiveness Council in the implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Facility, the budgetary instrument at the heart of the Next Generation EU European Recovery Plan, in particular to better coordinate actions between Member States.
As such, the development of multinational projects was discussed. Asked by EUROPE about the advisability of developing such projects, the Portuguese Minister for the Economy and Digital Transition, Pedro Siza Vieira, considered that the important project of common European interest (IPCEI) could be a way forward. For the Portuguese, it is important to always take into account the interests of SMEs in these projects.
The question of strategic autonomy was raised repeatedly. But, as always on this sensitive issue, the Ministers, mainly from Northern Europe, insisted on the importance of keeping the Union “open” to the world and defending multilateralism. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)