The European shipping fleet is one of the largest in the world, representing 35% of the world fleet enabling the EU to play a leading role in the global supply chains.
Europe’s maritime manufacturing and shipping cluster faces increasing global competition and security risks. Strengthening its competitiveness – while advancing the cluster’s green and digital transition – is essential. The industry aims, by 2035, to invest more than €10 billion in highly efficient, automated and sustainable production facilities, and to recruit and re/upskill a total of 500,000 qualified workers.
Growing resource use is driving the triple planetary crisis, pushing the EU beyond planetary boundaries and leaving many Member States off track for the 2030 circular material use target. Demand-side measures and ambitious primary material reduction policies are essential to reverse this trend and strengthen the EU’s strategic autonomy.
This exploratory opinion will feed into the work of the European Commission during the preparations of the Circular Economy Act.
The opinion deals with the 28th Regime legislative initiative whose purpose is to provide companies, especially innovative ones, with a single set of rules to invest more easily and operate in the Single Market.
In this own-initiative opinion, the EESC argues that deeper integration of the Single Market is essential to boost productivity, particularly in the services sector, which remains less integrated despite its growing economic importance.
The Multimodal digital mobility services (MDMS) initiative is aimed to support the development of multimodal ticketing services within and across passenger transport modes, with the intention to significantly improve multimodality, inclusiveness and sustainability in the EU, within Member States and across borders.
