Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-09-13-Speech-2-674-000"
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"en.20110913.44.2-674-000"2
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"Madam President, I should like to begin by thanking the honourable Member who tabled this question, because I think it is crucial at this very complicated stage of the crisis.
The Commission is also currently considering a political instrument designed to show greater symmetry and reciprocity in negotiations for market access. During the impact assessment for this initiative, the Commission will be sure to analyse, in particular, the participation of SMEs in public tenders in third countries.
Fifth question: the Commission is fully aware of the essential role of small and medium-sized enterprises in supporting and developing the European economy and for getting out of this crisis. Therefore, protecting the interests of SMEs and micro-enterprises – which we also talk about too little – is a priority. In the communication entitled ‘A Strategic Vision for European Standards’, the Commission lays the foundations for increasing the active participation of SMEs in the European standardisation process. In order to implement this strategy, the proposal for a regulation on European standardisation provides for SMEs to be funded to participate in the standardisation process.
Likewise, the Commission strongly believes in the use of international standards, mainly those developed by the International Organisation for Standardisation and the International Electrotechnical Commission. European standards must be developed, while remaining mindful of existing international standards so as to facilitate international trade and to help cash-strapped SMEs to adapt their products to the often incompatible standards of countries outside the EU’s internal market.
The Commission has also launched trade and economic talks with the most significant countries for the European economy, namely, the United States, Russia, China and Japan. These talks will also address various standardisation policies in order to come to solutions to target free exchanges of products in future.
As I was saying to Mr Theurer just before the start of this sitting, I think it is also very significant that I am signing agreements with the countries of Latin America, which is another extremely interesting market for SMEs.
Hence, we have standardisation and are working on SMEs in Chile, Argentina and Brazil, but there is also important work going on in North Africa. Many SMEs are being established there, which can bring hope to young people – the leaders of the recent uprising – and also allow our SMEs to enter into joint ventures in these African countries. This will not only help to stabilise the situation, thereby introducing a political aspect to the internationalisation of our SMEs, but also presents a business opportunity because there is already a deep-rooted European presence in these markets. However, in my view, there is still more to be done in stimulating growth and development in Africa, stabilising the Mediterranean area, and cutting the grass beneath the feet of terrorism, fundamentalism and piracy. I therefore predict an important political role for our SMEs in a sensitive area such as the Mediterranean.
That is why working towards internationalisation is becoming a priority for me and I think that this tight collaboration with Parliament can become truly essential for the growth of a sector of the economy that I believe is utterly crucial for getting us out of this crisis.
If we wish to overcome the crisis, we have to support the real economy. To support the real economy, we have to work on behalf of small and medium-sized enterprises, which must develop, of course, within the European Union. We have a large internal market of some 500 million citizens, or consumers. At the same time, we must try to work on promoting internationalisation, in order to stop businesses from relocating.
Madam President, honourable Members, I believe that these 23 million small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) can truly be an extraordinary lever for stimulating growth at this time. It is our duty to help them and to remove all the obstacles they come up against, because as we well know, even the instruments that we offer them are not enough: a great deal is also done at a national level to help SMEs, with positive initiatives and the Commission’s helpdesks. Meanwhile, the European Commission has decided to appoint an ambassador for small and medium-sized enterprises or a ‘Mr SME’. Tomorrow, there is a meeting of all the small and medium-sized enterprise ambassadors of the European Union and it is quite significant that all 27 Member States have appointed their ambassador very quickly indeed.
This is an important step forward, but we need a more robust strategy: the internal market will not suffice; we need to go and prospect elsewhere and, unfortunately, the data we have is not encouraging. Only 25% of SMEs operate outside their own country and only 13% operate outside the European Union. This is too little in comparison with the potential of this network of extraordinary people who create jobs and wealth. That is why we are working to put this internationalisation strategy together in short order.
Through it, we have set ourselves a number of tasks: to create an inventory of the instruments available at European, national and regional level; to increase the transparency of these instruments and create coordination between them, because often SMEs have many instruments available to them but do not know which is best to use, while they are also often incompatible or competing with one another, so we need to incentivise greater cooperation; we must rationalise our plans for supporting potential markets, for example, by putting forward guidelines and good practices based on geographical priorities; we must create an online portal that could, for example, be used to store all relevant information by theme and by country.
I think I have now answered the first question, so I will move on to the second. Updating customs regulations – as mentioned during the speech introducing the oral question – reconciles the commitment to ease trade together with the use of specific tools for customs checks, such as widespread use of standardised computer systems. In this vein, simplifying and cutting the costs of customs formalities through IT solutions is particularly in the interests of SMEs, while increasing use of computers will allow SMEs to be more competitive and more organised in terms of customs and in all other areas where we need to act to help businesses.
For example, SMEs can become high-tech businesses, which eases the completion of customs formalities. On the other hand, the ongoing review of the implementing measures of the Modernised Customs Code suggests bearing in mind the specific characteristics of each business, particularly SMEs.
Moving on to the third question, it is true that SMEs intending to start trading internationally can now benefit from a number of national and European organisations and programmes, yet we also need to achieve greater coherence between the various systems for supporting SMEs, particularly by incentivising synergies and complementarities between existing tools – without creating any overlaps. European, national and regional coordination of programmes to support new or established SMEs – as well as non-EU SMEs – based on the principles of complimentarity, efficiency and sustainability, will be an integral part of the Commission’s strategy.
Question number four: the Commission’s policies aim to help open up international trade and eliminate trade barriers in order to ensure non-discrimination for European businesses, including SMEs. The current economic situation makes these principles even more essential and the Commission believes that public procurement procedures present a fresh opportunity for international trade. That is why we at the Commission are always concerned to include the interests of Member States – including SMEs, of course – in all ongoing bilateral trade negotiations, as well as in the framework of the multilateral agreement on public tenders."@en1
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