Debate: Outcome of the EU-US summit
Date: THURSDAY, 9 NOVEMBER 2023
Speaker: Věra Jourová
Language: EN

We believe that the strength of our transatlantic partnership remains a deterrent to any who would seek to exploit weaknesses within it. The European Union and the United States share a profound and strategic relationship rooted in history, values and interests. We are firmly committed to nurturing and building upon this partnership beyond the upcoming 2024 election cycle. Several of you asked about the concrete projects – Mr Tudorache, and several other honourable Members. So, I will go through the list of the concrete things we work on together. First of all, many Members mentioned the slow progress, if any, on the agreement on steel and aluminium and critical materials. So, here I want to say that the summit resulted in important progress towards a global arrangement on sustainable steel and aluminium, and also Critical Minerals Agreement. On GSA, the aluminium and steel, we made headway in identifying the sources of non-market excess capacity, and getting a better shared understanding of the tools we will need to decarbonise the steel and aluminium industries. We are committed to continue making progress on the agreement in the next two months, including with a view to foster undistorted transatlantic trade in these sectors. So, once again, we have given ourselves an additional two more months to solve this. This is our objective and we continue to share a joint sense of urgency with you. On the critical materials, we also advanced significantly. We will continue to engage with the United States, and also consult with our Member States, with a view to getting an agreement over the finishing line. Our objective is a full international agreement, which will allow EU critical materials to benefit from subsidies for electric vehicles under the Inflation Reduction Act, and help integrate transatlantic critical material, critical mineral, and battery supply chains. So, this is the update on these two agreements. Now, back to the Technology and Trade Council, its technological part. One last comment on the Inflation Reduction Act. Ms Piñero, we recently adopted a communication as a reaction on the Inflation Reduction Act, the update of the response of the EU, and there is very relevant data being used for the communication. I also want to mention, under the list of projects, the Clean Energy Incentives Dialogue, which is also connected with the Inflation Reduction Act, as you know. On the technology side, we have several priorities, which we confirmed; we will discuss them further still this year on the next session. Then we should have the last one under this administration – and it should be in spring – to wrap up, summarise the results of common efforts and discuss the possible future continuation. But, of course, the elections are coming, and so we have to work together till spring, and then to plan with some level of uncertainty. At the same time, I want to mention four priorities under the technology side of TTC. First is the stabilisation of cooperation in the field of semiconductors, including supply chains. When I say stabilisation, I mean not ad hoc reactions on some shortages or some unexpected situations, but something more systematic, something more predictable, where we can rely on each other. The second thing is cooperation on quantum and related technologies, especially common research, usage of Horizon-relevant programmes on the US side. The same or similar way ahead of us is for AI. Again, strong cooperation in the research field. As you may know, recently, Gina Raimondo announced the establishment of the institute on generative AI safety. She announced it in London. After we finalise the AI Act, we will also be able to announce a similar arrangement on the European Union side. Cooperation in research field is more than needed in the field of AI and generative AI, foundation models, and so on. Also, we are continuing consultations when it comes to regulatory response on possible risks posed by artificial intelligence. Convergence of rules and common work on future global rules is a very important project still ahead of us. I am sure that if the democratic world joins forces and becomes the rules makers for the technologies, rather than rules takers, we will win a very important global battle, because the field of technologies is unfortunately, in the current world, a battlefield. The third thing – or the last priority we have, under TTC technology part – is intensive cooperation and common projects to promote digitalisation and development of technologies and innovations in third countries. Plenty of work, a lot has been done; some things are still ahead of us, but I believe that by spring 2024, we will be able to announce very concrete results stemming from our mutual cooperation with the United States.