Competitiveness
17
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01
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2025

Summary of the event “Competitiveness and... Financing the Competitive Transition”

The 2025 Polish Presidency is a chance to enhance Poland's EU role through relationships, narratives, and business engagement in key debates.

On Wednesday 15 January, the BSP office in Brussels hosted a conference entitled. ‘Competitiveness and ... Financing the competitive transition', organised by Business & Science Poland in cooperation with the Lewiatan Confederation, the Electric Vehicle Promotion Foundation, the Institute of Green Economy and Bank Gospodarstwo Krajowego. The event was opened with keynote speeches by Robert Kropiwnicki, Deputy Minister of State Assets, and Borys Budka, Chairman of the European Parliament's Committee on Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE). The President of the Management Board of Business & Science Poland, Bartek Czyczerski, also took the floor and emphasised that the conference being held was the first discussion on EU policy-making under the auspices of the Polish Presidency of the EU Council.

The discussion centred around the ‘Re-charging Europe’ report prepared by the Green Economy Institute and Cambridge Econometrics, presented by its authors Marcin Korolec and Edo Omic. The main recommendation of the report, presented by Minister Korolec, was the proposal to finance the recently announced EU Competitiveness Fund through EU Community debt, in a similar way to the Reconstruction Fund model. Describing the results of Cambridge Econometrics' research contained within the report, Edo Omic highlighted, inter alia, the disproportionately low spending of the EU to support competitiveness in the EU (NextGenEU) compared to the USA (so-called Inflation Reduction Act) or even Canada.

The next item of the event was a debate which revolved around two issues concerning the future of innovation funding and maintaining the competitiveness of European economies, also in the context of the recommendations of the ‘Re-charging Europe’ report. The panel discussion, in addition to Marcin Korolec, included:

  • Caroline Vandierendonck, Head of Unit at the One Stop Shop Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (STEP), European Commission;
  • Piotr Jabłoński, Managing Director, International Relations Division at Bank Gospodarstwo Krajowego;
  • Paweł Widel, President of the Association of Employers of Automotive and Industrial Products, Polish Confederation Lewiatan;
  • Reinhilde Weugelers, Senior Fellow, Breugel.

The first issue discussed was how to effectively combine public and private spending, and the second was how to generate a convincing business case to attract the private sector to invest in EU industry and development projects.

The panellists agreed that the EU faces an epochal challenge to remain competitive, especially vis-à-vis US and Chinese industry. During the discussion, the need to focus on broader EU policymaking, focused not only on the amount of funding that would be required to keep EU industry competitive, resounded. It was concluded that before funding modalities and models could be considered, the focus should be on creating the right conditions for business development and innovation from the legislative side, as well as removing existing obstacles, including high energy and labour prices and streamlining and simplifying administrative burdens. The need to invest in research and development of innovative technologies was emphasised, including in the area of the automotive industry, for decades the main pillar of EU industry. It was also agreed that in order for the EU to become a place of innovation again, attractive investment proposals should also be created, which would encourage EU investors to invest in European markets.  

The event provided an excellent opportunity for industry, finance, EU legislators and experts to exchange views on how to address the challenge of the EU's declining competitiveness in the global marketplace, and to jointly articulate ways to address this challenge in a considered manner.

Video of the event

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