2023-10-03 13:54:00
10 billion more. This is the sum requested and voted for by the European Parliament on Tuesday, October 3, concerning the 2024-2027 budget, initially set at 66 billion euros by the European Commission.
As a reminder, the EU budget approved in 2020 for the period 2021-2027 amounts to 2.018 billion euros at current prices. A sum which includes the post-Covid European recovery plan, called NextGenerationEU, by 800 billion euros.
An extension to face future challenges
The additional 10 billion demanded by MEPs concerns migration management, investments in new technologies to improve the competitiveness of the European economy and the reserve to respond to crises. The elected Portuguese social democrat, Margarida Marques, co-rapporteur of the text voted on Tuesday, welcomed this “ engagement ” but it still has to lead to a ” ambitious response », she underlined during a debate that same day. It is not ” not acceptable to do more with less money », Launched the other co-rapporteur of the text, the Polish Christian Democrat, Jan Olbrycht.
Because the challenges that Europe will have to face are numerous and important. Among them, the autonomy and competitiveness of the Old Continent in strategic technologies is particularly scrutinized. The European Commission is also due to unveil this Tuesday a list of key technologies which will need to be better monitored and defended once morest rival states like China. A list, which might include artificial intelligence, quantum technologies or semiconductors, and which echoes the EU’s announcement on September 13 concerning the open investigation into Chinese subsidies for electric cars.
« Global markets are now flooded with cheap Chinese electric cars, the price of which is kept artificially low by massive government subsidies », had castigated the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, in the speech on the state of the European Union, in Strasbourg.
If, at the end of its investigation, the Commission finds violations of trade rules, it might impose punitive customs duties on Chinese vehicles, at the risk of triggering a trade war with Beijing. China has, in fact, denounced this European decision “taken in the name of “fair competition”” and judged to be “openly protectionism”. Elle “will have a negative impact on economic and trade relations between China and the European Union”, warned the Chinese Ministry of Commerce.
The EU still needs to convince member states
Already on June 20, the Brussels executive had detailed a strategy to better defend European economic interests while remaining an open continent. The Commission then announced the establishment of a list of essential technologies for which risk mitigation measures would be considered. The budgetary extension voted by Parliament would therefore provide additional room for maneuver for the Union to defend its economic and geopolitical interests.
But this budget is still far from being validated. The decision will fall to the Member States who must negotiate and unanimously approve the revised multiannual budget, before submitting it for a green light from Parliament. However, the net contributors (Germany, France, etc.) to the Union budget are reluctant to put more into the pot, beyond the necessary support for Ukraine, while their national accounts are already affected by the economic slowdown. An exchange of views between the twenty-seven is planned during a summit of heads of state and government on October 26 and 27 in Brussels.
The Spanish Secretary of State for European Affairs, Pascual Navarro-Rios, whose country holds until the end of the year the biannual presidency of the Council of the EU, which brings together the 27 member countries, promised to work actively to a compromise. “ The Council is fully committed to reaching an agreement as quickly as possible “, he assured MEPs in Strasbourg.
(With AFP)
1696348491
#Parliament #increase #budget #billion #euros
