EU Industry Days - Climate Dialogues

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Dear Commissioner (Cher Thierry), ladies and gentlemen,

Good morning. It is a real pleasure to join this plenary debate on the Green Deal.  

Allow me, first, to congratulate the European Commission for this new edition of the EU Industry Days. I just went through the programme. You have an impressive line-up of sessions and speakers. Thanks, because putting industry high on the EU agenda matters very much in these challenging times. 

Also, I would like to thank you, Commissioner Breton, for your timely decision to update the European industrial strategy. It is a golden opportunity to not only accelerate the green and digital transformation, but also to rethink our economic, social, and industrial reality, especially considering the impact of Covid. We have just published a set of BusinessEurope recommendations to contribute to this important reflection. 

Now, turning to our debate. The title of the session is “Green = growth, or how European companies can champion green transition”. I see five key points to highlight: 

First, Europe needs a strong industrial basis. The Covid pandemic shows once again how critical it is to have a strong industry. Countries with a well-developed and diversified industrial landscape appear to be in a better position to react on major shocks like this pandemic. Quantity, but also quality, matters. What I mean is that we need competitive and very innovative companies. Those at the forefront of developing and producing vaccines, as well as all equipment for the management of the health crisis, are very dynamic and innovative companies. And the same is true for all businesses involved in the logistics to support the availability of essential goods and services.

Here, I think the approach of “industrial ecosystems” can play an important role. It can help fostering synergies across all industrial players and channelling investments in innovative industries. It can also reinforce production process mastering which is of the essence for operational excellence (meaning better quality for products, better delivery delays, etc.). But what is important now is to move, as quick as possible, from the analytical phase to the actions phase. 

My second point is that Green deal is a firm ambition of European citizens. Even in times of pandemic, with huge socio-economic impacts, European citizens’ attention to the environment remains high. The last European Parliament survey shows that more than half of respondents (56%) think that the EU should do more to achieve its objective of making the EU economy climate neutral by 2050. Only 11% think that it is doing too much in this regard. 

This shows how deep the awareness across society is. Even if the day-to-day actions by individuals often reflect wider considerations such as costs, health, or safety, it shows clearly that industry and business need to factor this “environmentalist mindset” in their long-term strategies.

My third point is: Green transition = opportunities for business. Industry is at the core of the green transition. ~80% of solutions are coming from industry itself (e.g., hydrogen, smart grids, bioeconomy or carbon capture utilisation and storage). Studies suggest that the global market volume for climate technologies will grow to 1 to 2 trillion € per year towards 2030. By creating a policy framework to support and develop the European market for green tech, our companies can conquer a substantial piece of this growth market and boost EU exports.

At the same time, we should be mindful that global competition will be fierce. The recent announcements by US President Biden to inject massive public spending in support of the green transition is a strong signal in that regard. 

My fourth point is that we must avoid excessive burden on companies. We need a business-friendly environment, where companies can take risks, bring innovative solutions to the market and get return on investments. What we need is a marketplace of “green” ideas. For this to happen, policymakers must be extremely vigilant to avoid that too much burden is put on companies that are deeply affected by an unprecedented crisis. Rigid, prescriptive, and intrusive new norms, legal requirements or taxes should really be minimised. 

All in all, a slogan like “trust – motivation – advice” seems to me much smarter than “constraints – control – sanctions”. 

As an example, we are very concerned about the Commission’s plans around sustainable corporate governance. They point to a strong and unjustified interference on how companies function, how they hire their directors and how they can make them accountable. These changes, based on a biased and badly sourced study, will ultimately lead to deadlocks making companies more risk-averse and less entrepreneurial.  

Equally important, the EU needs to preserve existing “carbon leakage” measures in policies such as the Emissions Trading System. Today (and probably tomorrow as well), European companies are not operating in a world where all major economies have similar climate ambitions. It is therefore critical to keep these measures fully in place. 

My fifth and last point is that green and digital transition reinforce each other’s. The two are very much going together. The digital transition is a fantastic source of productivity. For example, the use of AI and big data brings huge opportunities to optimise production processes and ultimately reduce energy consumption per unit of production. Digitalisation can also bring strong benefits for the efficiency of transport systems, for instance for pan-European, city or local traffic controls, in freight or passenger transportation. There is a clear case here for a virtuous circle between these two twin transitions.

Ladies and gentlemen,

To conclude, let me stress that we will only succeed making Europe the first climate neutral continent if it builds on a strong and frank dialogue. The speed with which we will overcome the challenges and maximise the opportunities will be determined by our capacity to discuss and collectively answer the many “HOW questions” that are still unanswered today. 

That is why BusinessEurope announces today the start of a new initiative called “Climate Dialogues”. We invite policymakers, civil society, scientists, industrialists, and everyone interested to join a series of meetings, discussions, reflections on HOW to reach climate neutrality. We will use all possible channels such as webinars, social medias, videos or interviews to deepen our dialogue around these “HOW questions”. You will find all information on our website. We very much look forward to engaging with you over the coming months. 

Thank you for your attention.