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BusinessEurope Headlines No. 2016-19

BusinessEurope Council of Presidents meets in The Hague

On the invitation of VNO-NCW - the business federation of the Netherlands - the Council of Presidents of BusinessEurope met on 19 and 20 May in The Hague. The Presidents of our 40 member federations were received by King Willem-Alexander. They had an exchange of views with Prime Minister Mark Rutte on the achievements of the Dutch presidency and priority actions to be taken by the end of June to strengthen the economic recovery. They also had an internal debate on the future of Europe as a global player, kicked off by a presentation by Maxime Verhagen, President of the Dutch national federation of building and infrastructure companies and former Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs. The importance of developing a coherent EU global strategy with a strong economic pillar was stressed by all federations. Further details will be given in a statement to be published next week. Photo © ANP, Robin van Lonkhuisen

Contact: Thérèse de Liedekerke

BusinessEurope in Geneva

Director General Markus J. Beyrer met Chinese officials, including China’s Ambassador to the WTO in Geneva on 23 May to discuss the setting-up of a dialogue on EU-China relations involving business, politicians and think-tanks. This type of dialogue already exists with Japan and the USA, involving Keidanren and the US Chamber respectively. This was also an opportunity to talk about the on-going discussions in Europe on market economy status and how to treat China in anti-dumping procedures after December 2016, sharing BusinessEurope’s views on the issue. BusinessEurope also met WTO’s Director-General Roberto Azevêdo and the EU Ambassador to the WTO, Marc Vanheukelen, to talk about the WTO work programme following the 10th ministerial conference in Nairobi in December 2015 and the priorities for European business. Digital trade and investment are among the topics that might receive backing from a larger number of WTO members to be included in the future work programme. We also discussed with Mr Azevêdo how we could work together to make the case for trade.

Contact: Luisa Santos

Markus J. Beyrer speaks at industrial conference in Athens

"Greece has made significant efforts and the political debate on the business location starts to go in the right direction. But more needs to be done. Greece needs more industry and more, larger companies to be involved successfully in high-end international value chains, needs to broaden its tax base instead of increasingly taxing those who already pay taxes, needs a justice reform to attract more foreign direct investment and needs to be more outward-looking and export-oriented”, BusinessEurope Director General Markus J. Beyrer said on 24 May at the Industrial conference of the Hellenic Federation of Enterprises (SEV) in Athens.

Contact: Nicolas Rathauscher

Message to the Competitiveness Council meeting on 26-27 May

BusinessEurope acknowledges that some progress was made to enhance competitiveness in the EU and make it an attractive place for investment, leading to growth and jobs. To continue driving the EU competitiveness agenda forward, we need to put in place a renewed industrial policy, promote a more innovation-friendly agenda, deliver the Commission’s digital single market strategy and avoid measures such as the new proposal to revise the posting of workers directive, which will undermine the single market for services.

Read more or contact: Daniele Olivieri

Post-crisis social dialogue discussed at ILO-EC conference in Paris

A key challenge to underpin the restart of the social dialogue after the crisis is to ensure at all levels that social dialogue contributes positively to the competitiveness of enterprises. This was the key message of Maxime Cerutti, BusinessEurope Social Affairs Director, at a conference jointly organised by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the European Commission in the premises of the French Senate, in Paris on 20 May 2016. “More research by the ILO and the European Commission on the link between social dialogue and competitiveness in a global and EU context would be useful. The European social partners also have a role in promoting mutual learning between social partners to contribute to more ownership for necessary reforms at national level”, he concluded.

Contact: Guillaume Cravero

Seminar on sustainable supply chains: sharing private sector experiences

Companies are instrumental in making global supply chains more sustainable - the challenge is to build a business model that is competitive, while promoting high-level environmental and social standards. This was the main message of BusinessEurope Director General Markus J. Beyrer when opening a BusinessEurope seminar on 25 May. The seminar allowed our member federations and companies to have a frank and honest discussion with EU policy-makers, NGOs and other stakeholders about the challenges companies face in making their supply chains sustainable, but also recognising that this brings business opportunities and benefits. "BusinessEurope remains committed to a constructive and open debate", Markus J. Beyrer concluded, "and we hope that this seminar helps pave the way to making the relationship between trade, social and environmental policies more effective and mutually beneficial."

Contact: Rebekah Smith or Sofia Bournou

A workable contractual framework for the new digital age

Creating a single and clear set of rules for business-to-consumer digital contracts in the EU is an important objective for businesses.  However, harmonisation should not come at any cost. The new rules need to be well balanced and reconcile consumer interests and business needs. Widening the rules to cover digital content supplied against data deserves a wider debate and prior in-depth legal and economic analysis. A possible overlap with provisions in the recently adopted general data protection regulation needs to be avoided. These were the messages conveyed by Jacek Barankiewicz, Chairman of BusinessEurope Consumer/Marketing Working Group during a public hearing at the European Parliament on 24 May.

Read more or contact: Pedro Oliveira

BusinessEurope joins voluntary scheme to promote good practices on preventing risks from exposure to carcinogens at work

Employers are committed to preventing or reducing their workers' exposure to carcinogens at the workplace and exchanging good practices and raising awareness in this area is a crucial part of this. This was the main message of the Chair of BusinessEurope Health and Safety working group, Kris de Meester, on 25 May at the launch of the covenant on a voluntary action scheme on raising awareness and exchanging good practices to deal with risks arising from occupational exposure to carcinogens. The covenant was also signed by the European Commission, the European Trade Union Confederation and the Dutch Presidency. Kris de Meester highlighted that BusinessEurope will encourage its national member federations and sectoral organisations to highlight good practice in this area and to raise awareness of the action scheme.

Read more or contact: Rebekah Smith

1st EU-GCC Business Forum – Creating a platform for closer cooperation between the two regions

On 23 and 24 May 2016 in Brussels, the 1st EU-GCC Business Forum gathered business and political leaders from the EU and the Gulf Cooperation Council. High-level participants took stock of the current developments in the EU and GCC economies and had the opportunity to discuss ways to increase trade and investment opportunities between the two regions. In this context, creating an enabling business environment, especially for SMEs and young entrepreneurs, while effectively addressing (tariff and non-tariff) barriers to trade were identified as key areas that require further attention. Participants agreed that both governments and the private sector should seek ways to work closely together on these issues. On the second day of the business forum, participants had the opportunity to discuss youth employment in particular. They exchanged views on the importance of vocational education and training in supporting youth employment in both regions and shared best practices.

Contact: Sofia Bournou or Robert Plummer

Multilateral is the way forward for harmonisation of patent law

On 18 May 2016 in London, BusinessEurope together with its US and Japanese intellectual property (IP) partners met representatives of the IP offices from Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Japan, South Korea, Spain, the UK, the USA and the EPO to continue discussions on patent law harmonisation. Harmonisation could only bring benefits in a multilateral framework. IP offices announced their plans to conduct a consultation, subject to a final decision in the autumn.

Contact: Ilias Konteas

Calendar

Last updated: 29 July 2016