Former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi will present a report on Monday with recommendations to strengthen European competitiveness, in which he will advocate a “radical change” to confront powers such as the United States and China on the world stage.
He will do this at a press conference. with the new President of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyenwho commissioned him to prepare the report during the last legislature and will have the power to incorporate the formulas proposed by the Italian into the policy he will implement during this second legislature.
He also former president of the European Central Bank (ECB) already presented last Wednesday to the ambassadors of the 27 Member States and to the leaders of all the groups of the European Parliament outline of a document which will be structured, according to diplomatic sources, in five chapters: productivity, reduction of dependencies, climate, social inclusion and specific recommendations for the ten main sectors of the European economy.
Draghi stressed that in recent decades, European competitiveness has suffered a series of “structural brakes” which the EU needs to address, including the lack of innovation capacity, rising energy prices, skills gaps – particularly technological – and the need to accelerate digitalisation, as well as urgently strengthen defence capabilities.
The development of the capital market, state aid rules, cohesion policy and increasing investment are other priorities considered by the economist, who also discussed the relations with the United States and China.
Before the co-legislators, Draghi warned that it will be necessary to involve the private sectorunprecedented cooperation between member states and institutional reforms to implement its recommendations, according to sources familiar with the debate.
“He is sounding the alarm”summed up after the parliamentary meeting the chairman of the Greens, Bas Eikchout, who explained that Draghi criticised the “complacency” of an EU that is not fully aware of the problems it will face in the future and called for change.
“We need an EU prepared for the world of today and tomorrow“What I will therefore propose in the report (…) is a radical change,” the former president said in April in a speech in which he warned that international rivalries had increased and that other powers no longer respected the same rules as Europe.
Countries like The United States and China, he said, are adopting policies aimed at strengthening their competitiveness. which, at best, aim to redirect investments towards their own economy to the detriment of the European one and, at worst, to make Europeans permanently dependent on them.
Faced with this, the EU finds itself without a strategy enabling it to maintain the pace in the race for technological leadershipprotect their traditional industries or guarantee essential supplies, constrained in their response by an organization and financing designed for “yesterday’s world,” in Draghi’s words.
He therefore recommended undertaking a “transformation of the economy” based on three vectors: taking advantage of the size of a single market with 450 million consumers, investing jointly in European public goods – such as energy interconnections or supercomputers – and ensuring the availability of critical supplies and qualified personnel.
These ideas will likely form the basis of a report that will be added to the one published in April of former Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta, focused precisely on exploiting the potential of the European market to prevent the EU from losing further ground.
