Companies are moving to the US as they face administrative burdens and high energy costs in Europe, Stefano Mallia, the head of the Employers Group of the European Economic and Social Committee, told EURACTIV.cz in an interview.
The relocation of companies mainly concerns those sectors dependent on high energy use, according to Mallia. “I can call it a real and present danger,” he said, adding that the EU has to put the competitiveness agenda to the forefront of its policymaking.
“Competitiveness needs to be at the heart of the EU’s thinking, and we think that in the new forthcoming Commission, there should be a European Commissioner responsible for the competitiveness of our economy, which is not the case at the moment,” Mallia told EURACTIV.cz.
The EESC Employers Group pushed the EU to introduce a “competitiveness check”. Such a check would mean that during the EU’s decision-making processes, the impact of the proposed legislation on the business environment would be analysed.
“Our proposal was initially resisted by the European Commission, but a few months back, in times when the discussion on competitiveness opened, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said indeed that they will implement it,” Mallia said.
“Still, we do not know how it will work as the answers we are getting are still somewhat vague,” he added.
Mallia also expressed objections against the EU’s Net Zero Industry Act which the European Commission proposed in reaction to the US’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA). According to him, the Act focuses only on green technologies and thus takes a “pick-a-winner approach”, which the Employers Group does not favour.
“What about the other industries that today need to make the transition? We cannot afford to take a decision on which sectors will die. We need to provide funding to all of them if they are able and willing to make the transition,” Mallia said, stressing that the EU needs to have a competitiveness agenda focusing on all the industries, which is not the case now.
(Aneta Zachová | EURACTIV.cz)
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