EESC Corner: EU and US should use momentum for closer, strategic EU-US partnership

At its last plenary session before the summer break, the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) adopted an own-initiative opinion entitled “The new EU-US Trade and Technology Council in action: priorities for the business, workers, and consumers and necessary safeguards.”

In this opinion, the EESC highlighted the growing need for a closer EU-US partnership. The EU and the US have the most integrated economic relationship in the world, and the US remains by far the EU’s largest trade and investment partner. Moreover, the highly complex geopolitical situation and the unexpected multitude of crises, including the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine, make it clear that the EU should now, more than ever, strengthen cooperation with like-minded countries that share the same values, such as the US.

The EESC therefore recognizes this is a critical moment for the EU and the US to use the momentum for a closer EU-US partnership and deepen their political and economic cooperation with other democratic states with open, rules-based market economies to protect our values and strengthen prosperity, democracy, rule of law, security and human rights.

As a member of the EESC Employers’ Group and the study group working on this own-initiative opinion, I actively participated in the plenary debate on the TTC that took place on 14 July. I emphasized that European business strongly supports the TTC and hopes more concrete results and deliverables can emerge from this very important project. I highlighted that the main focus should be on advancing the bilateral relation and boosting trade and investment ties between the EU and the US, fostering growth and competitiveness. Among other things, I also pointed out the importance of digital trade and the urgent need for a new agreement on transatlantic data flows.

In this regard, the EESC rightly calls in its opinion for a rapid conclusion of the new framework for data transfers, as well as for coordination between the ten TTC working groups and active engagement of stakeholders on both sides of the Atlantic, which is essential for the TTC to reach its targets. Therefore, the EESC will actively engage within the TTC structures and strives to be involved in the TTC ministerial meetings as a unique civil society stakeholder.

You can read the whole opinion here: https://www.eesc.europa.eu/en/our-work/opinions-information-reports/op…

Jana Hartman Radová, EESC Member of Employers’ Group