While the European Union had proposed it as early as December 2020, it announced jointly with Washington, on Tuesday 15 June, at the end of the summit with US President Joe Biden, the launch of an EU-US Trade and Technology Council.
It will be used to cooperate closely to avoid trade barriers and develop common standards on new technologies.
“It’s about shaping our digital economies together, in line with our shared values”, said EU Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis.
According to the joint EU-US statement, this Council will include working groups on “technology standards cooperation (including on AI, Internet of Things, among other emerging technologies), climate and green tech, ICT security and competitiveness, data governance and technology platforms, the misuse of technology threatening security and human rights, export controls, investment screening, promoting SMEs access to, and use of, digital technologies, global trade challenges, and strengthening our most critical supply chains”.
There are also plans to establish an EU-US partnership to balance the supply chains for semiconductors.
The autonomy of both parties regarding the regulation will not be affected by the Council’s exchanges.
The two partners also intend to establish an EU-US policy dialogue on competition in technology. It is expected to focus on different approaches to competition policy and collaboration in the technology sector. To this end, exchanges between experts from both sides of the Atlantic are planned.
The EU and the US want to ensure a secure flow of data. They have therefore committed to working together on this issue and on consumer protection.
Another important point of this summit was the agreement between the two parties for a five-year tariff suspension in the Airbus/Boeing dispute ( see other news).
WTO
The reform of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is another objective that both sides want to achieve together. They hope to impose a leadership that promotes the values of multilateralism and allows the body to regain its regulatory powers.
The two allies want to tackle, in particular, the rules on subsidies for industries, unfair behaviour by state-owned companies and other distorting practices.
The proper functioning of the WTO and its Dispute Settlement Body is also on the agenda, although the US has been at the root of the dysfunction of this body in recent years.
EU and US leaders also raised the issue of international taxation, which was agreed upon during the G7 summit (see EUROPE 12740/12). “We are determined to foster a fair, sustainable, and modern international tax system and cooperate to reach a global consensus on the question of taxation of multinational companies through the G20/OECD Inclusive Framework”, they said in their statement.
See the joint statement: https://bit.ly/3cM5oTw (Original version in French by Léa Marchal)