Today, the Commission presents the Competitiveness Compass, a key step in this mandate providing a clear framework for the Commissions work.
The Compass guides Europe to become a place where future technologies, services, and clean products are developed and marketed, while becoming the first climate-neutral continent.
Over the past twenty years, Europe has struggled to keep up with other major economies due to a persistent productivity gap. The EU has what it takes to turn this around with its talented and educated workforce, capital, savings, and internal market, provided urgent action is taken to address barriers and structural weaknesses.
President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, stated: “Europe has everything needed to succeed in the race to the top. But we must also address our weaknesses to regain competitiveness. The Competitiveness Compass turns the excellent recommendations of the Draghi report into a roadmap. We have a plan and the political will. What matters is speed and unity. The world is not waiting for us. All Member States agree on this. So, lets turn this consensus into action.”
Three core areas for action: innovation, decarbonisation and security
The Draghi Report identified three transformative imperatives to boost competitiveness, and the Compass outlines an approach and a selection of flagship measures to make these imperatives a reality:
- Closing the innovation gap: The EU must reignite its innovation engine. We aim to create an environment for young innovative start-ups and promote industrial leadership in high-growth sectors based on advanced technologies.
- Roadmap for decarbonisation and competitiveness: The Compass identifies high and volatile energy prices as a key challenge and sets out intervention areas to facilitate access to clean, affordable energy.
- Reducing dependencies and enhancing security: The EUs ability to diversify and reduce dependencies will rely on effective partnerships.
Five horizontal enablers for competitiveness
The three pillars are complemented by five horizontal enablers, which are essential to support competitiveness across all sectors:
- Simplification: This enabler aims to drastically reduce regulatory and administrative burdens.
- Lowering barriers to the Single Market: A Horizontal Single Market Strategy is introduced to improve functioning across all industries.
- Financing competitiveness: The EU needs an efficient capital market to turn savings into investments.
- Promoting skills and quality jobs: The foundation of Europes competitiveness is its people.
- Better coordination of policies at EU and national levels: The Commission will introduce a Competitiveness Coordination Tool.
Background
On 27 November 2024, President von der Leyen announced a Competitiveness Compass as the first major initiative of the Commission in this mandate, based on the Draghi report and providing the framework for the Commissions work on competitiveness in this mandate.
In her State of the Union address of 2023, President von der Leyen announced having asked former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi to prepare a report on the future of European competitiveness.
For More Information
A Competitiveness Compass for the EU
A factsheet on the Competitiveness Compass